Introductory lectures on political economy, being part of a course delivered in Easter term, 1831

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INTRODUCTORY LECTUK

POLITICAL ECON<

PART OF A COURSE
DELIVERED IN EASTER TERM, MDCC<

BY

RICHARD \^HATELY, D.

PRINCIPAL OF £T. ALBAN's HALL ;
PROFESSOR OF POLITICAL ECONOMY IN THE UNIVERSII

fintt itiffffou rots Xtyefitivois "hufntrfiait fAnft l^ufA^AXXt^ffeu fA\
MkXis Tig rSv ^fifnoupySvt ^fuvrtti \ ?Taf ^l hxet^rhs, n fiafft)
Sv ¥U» hnk^o/Atf, oux «/0';^g0y srigJ vevraiv /inrt t<tnr^at
ffVf/k^oiXXiffffut irt^4 avTMv ; Plato, ErastSB, §. 9.

LONDON,

B. FELLOWES, LUDGATE STRE
1881.

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sr^o

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MUNIFIOEXT AND ENLIGHTENED

FOUNDER

OP THE

PROFESSORSHIP OF POLITICAL-ECONOMY
AT OXFORD,

AND TO THE

MEMBERS OF CONVOCATION

THE ELECTORS,

THIS VOLUME

IS
RESPECTFULLY AND GRATEFULLY INSCRIBED

BY

THE AUTHOR.

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PREFACE.

The following pages are presented to the
public, in compliance with a requisition of
the Statute relative to the Professorship of
Political -Economy, that one Lecture at
least shall be published every year.

Conceiving that one object of that pro-
vision must be, that the public may have
some knowledge of what sort of Lectures
on the subject are annually delivered at
Oxford, 1 have not thought myself at
liberty to make any material alterations
in the Lectures as they were delivered.
Otherwise, I might, perhaps, have endea-
voured to change the method and the
style, adopted with a view to oral de-
livery, for such as might be more suited
to the closet. Perhaps, indeed, I might.

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but for that requisition, have hesitated as
to the publication of such a Work at all.
For the title of it is not unlikely to deter
one class of readers, and to disappoint
another. Those who have never applied
themselves to the study, may perhaps be
led to anticipate, from the title of Political-
Economy, something dryt abstruse, and
uninteresting ; and those again who are,
and have long been, conversant with it,
may perhaps expect such* discussions of
various important questions, as I have
thought it best not to enter on, in an in-
troductory Course.

It has been my first object, to combat
the prevailing prejudices against the study;
and especially those which represent it as
unfavourable to Religion. Convinced as I
am, that the world, as it always in fact has
been governed by political- economists of
some kind, must ultimately be under the
guidance of such as have systematically ap-
plied themselves to the science, I could not

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vu

but regard it as a point of primary import-
ance, to remove the impression existing in
the minds of many, both of the friends and
the adversaries of Christianity, as to the
hostility between that and the conclusions
of Political -Economy.

It was indeed, in great measure, this
feeling, that induced me to offer myself as
a candidate for the Professorship* I con-
sidered myself, in this, to be contributing,
as far as lay in me, to second what has
been done by the University of Oxford,
towards counteracting the false and dan-
gerous impressions to which I have al-
luded.

By accepting the endowment of a Pro*
fessorship of Political- Economy, the Uni-
versity may be regarded as having borne
her public testimony against that prejudice;
and as having thus rendered an important
service to the public, independently of the
direct benefits resulting from the culti-
vation of the science. And subsequently.

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vin

in appointing to the Professorship one of
her members, who is not only professionally
devoted to the Ministry of the Gospel, but
whom she has judged worthy (in the
office of Bampton Lecturer, and three
times in that of Select Preacher) to offer
religious instruction to an academical
audience, she has implied the full con-
viction of a Body which is above all sus-
picion of indifference to Christianity, that
there is at least no discordancy between
that and the pursuits of the political-
economist. However slender may be my
qualifications in the science, (a science
which no one, I conceive, has as yet fully
mastered,) the University has at least testi-
fied, in the appointment, the most complete
dissent from the notion, that the studies
of Political -Economy and of Theology are
unfriendly to each other.

It is unnecessary, I trust, to observe, that
these circumstances relative to myself are
not brought forward by way of testimonials

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IX

or recommendations on my own behalf.
One who has been ten years before the
public as an author, must be very sure
that, as an author, the public will judge
of him for themselves, without seeking, or
attending to, any testimonials from the
Society he belongs to. But it is on ac-
count of the University herself that I men-
tion these circumstances, as furnishing a
full vindication of the Academical Body,
as such, from all suspicion of participating
in those narrow prejudices, which would
set Science and Religion in array against
each other.

I trust that, before many years shall have
elapsed, the views of the University in ac-
cepting, and of her public-spirited Bene-
factor in founding, the Professorship, will
be to a considerable extent realized ; — ^that
idle prejudices against the science will be
done away by a distinct view of its real
character ; — and that there will be no one
who will not be ashamed of employing,

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much more of deliberately recommending,
(as some have ventured: to do,) undefined
language, and a loose style of reasoning, in
a subject in which the most careful accuracy
of expression is most especially called for.
I trust that, while due encouragement shall
still be afforded to those more strictly pro-
fessional studies which conduce to the pro-
fessional advancement in life of each indi-
vidual. Political -Economy will, ere long,
be enrolled in the list of those branches of
knowledge, which more peculiarly demand
the attention of an endowed University*;
those, namely, which, while the cultivation
of them is highly important to the public at
large ^ are not likely to be forwarded by the
stimulus of private .interest operating on
individuals. The lime is not, I trust, far
distant, when it will be regarded as dis-
creditable not to have regularly studied
those subjects, respecting which, even now,

' See Dr. Chalmers's excellent Work on Endowments.

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XI

every one is expected to feel an interest —
most are ready to adopt opinions — and
many are called on to form practical deci-
sions.

Alhcm Hall^ Oxford^
Jfay 17, 1831.

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CONTENTS.

LECTURE I.

Disadvantages resulting from the novelty of the name of
Political-Economy^ 3. and from the name itself> 4. the title
of CATALLACTICS^ or the science of Exchanges, would have
been more suitable, 6. In what sense Political-Economy is con-
versant about Wealth, 7- Objections to the study and misappre-
hensions respecting it, why noticed, 10.

Objection that political-economists have treated exclusively of
Wealth, 17. importance of the study in an endowed University, 23.
objection to a science conversant about Wealth, 25.

LECTURE II.

Mistake of making an appeal to Scripture on these subjects, 29.
connexion of this ^tudy with religion <^id morals^ 37* suppoied
hurtfulness of national wealth in a moral point of view, 40. Man-
deville's notion on this point, 44. distinction between individual
and national wealth, 54.

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XIV

LECTURE III.

Arguments against the systematic study of Political-Economy, 67.
common-sense, 68. experience, 71* paradoxes maintuned as the
conclusions of common-sense, 7B. whether Political-Economy is to
be regarded as a part of general education, 83. political-economists
far more numerous than is commonly supposed, 88. how the Art
and the Science of Political-Economy came to exist, 92. the study
worthy of cultivation for its own sake, 96.

LECTURE IV.

Man naturally a social Being, 99. connexion of Political-Economy
with Natural-Theology, 101. provisions made by Divine Wisdom
for the progress of Society, 111. existence of evil not to be ex-
plained, 113.

LECTURE V.

Whether mankind have emerged from the savage state, 119.
Scripture not to be referred to in the outset, in examining the
question, 123. historical evidence on the negative side, 124.
causes of degeneracy into barbarism, 131. confirmation of
Scripture-history from existing monuments, 133. errors re-
specting a " state of Nature," 136. scanty records of the
earliest human inventions, 138.

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XV

LECTURE VI.

Beginning of the advance in civilization^ 144. origin of
division of labour, 146. origin of Money, 163. Emulation, I
public interest promoted by individuals destitute of public-spii
163. effects of the conduct of a Miser, in different states
Society, 167-

LECTURE VII

Progress of Society in Wealth, considered as to its bearing
public morals, 173. progress of Knowledge, 175. anteccdi
probabilities that this should be favourable to moral improveme
179. demoralizing effects of famines, 185. and of barbari
invasions, 186. what steps should be taken by those who thi
increase of wealth unfavourable to virtue, 189. causes which hs
led to this opinion: poetical descriptions, 191. absolute amoi
of vice, greatest in populous regions, 195. and apparent amou
greater still, 197-

LECTURE VIII.

Inequalities in respect of moral advancement, independent
national wealth, 201. In what senses communities arc called ri
or poor, 203. differences in religion, 204. and institutions, 2(
and in distribution of wealth and modes of expenditure, 207 •

One danger arising from excessive division of labour, notSced
A. Smith, 209. what education is desirable for the laboiiri
classes, 217- another danger noticed by Mr. Senior, 221.

Evils of ill-conducted diffusion of knowledge, 227. huw to
prevented, 234.

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LECTURE I.

It is not my intention to occupy your time with
a panegyric on the judicious public-spirit dis-
played by the Founder of this Professorship, or
with a studied expression of thanks for the
honour conferred on me by the appointment.
The best way, I conceive, of at once evincing my
own fedings as to both these points, and fulfilling
the designs both of the Founder and of the
£]ector^, will be by doing my utmost to recom-
mend and to facilitate the study in question.

Nor shall I detain you by any lengthened
remarks on the labours of my predecessor. Not
to mention the peculiar circumstances which, in
this case, would render it a matter of more than
ordinary deUcacy, for me, to pronounce any
opinion on his Lectures, it may perhaps be laid
down universally, that the decision as to how
far any teacher has well performed his part, lies
proptrly with his audience.

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I think it right, however, not to pass unnoticed
one circumstance, which may be unknown to
some of you, and which may have been unthought
of by others, but which ought not in justice to
Mr. Senior's character to be lost sight of. The
praise of a Professor is usually confined to the
able and diligent discharge of his duties; the
credit of munificent public-spirit is in general con-
fined to the Founder of a Professorship. But
when a man actively and fully engaged in a lucra-
tive profession, (especially one for which the
preparation is a very expensive as well as
laborious education,) devotes to the business of
preparing and delivering lectures a large portion
of the time and toil which he would otherwise
have made subservient to his own emolument, he
may, and should, be considered as a pecuniary
benefactor to the Professorship, no less than if he
had bestowed on it a formal endowment equiva-
lent to what he has sacrificed. And according
to the best estimate I can form, the salary which
my predecessor received cannot have covered
above one-fifth of the loss which he thus incurred.
As this is not, like the degree of merit of a Course
of Lectures, a question of opinion, but of fact, I

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trust I shall meet with your indulgence for having
alluded to it.

The branch of study to which I am to call
your attention is usually spoken of as one of the
most modern ; — as dating its very origin almost
within the memory of man. This view is partly,
though not entirely, correct ; but it is important
to observe, that the study has the disadvantages
of novelty without the advantages. It professes
not to bring to light curious new facts ; which
are what stimulates curiosity, and arrests atten^
tion ; the subjects of which it treats are matters
the most trite and familiar. Its novelty is only
in the arrangemerU of well-known facts — in the
views taken of them, the language in which they
are described, and the general principles founded
cm them ; in all of which, novelty is a source of
difficulty, and often an occasion of hostile pre-
judice ; but possesses little or nothing of attrac-
tion. Above dl, the novelty of the name, I am
inclined to regard as on the whole a very con-
siderable disadvantage. The advances made in
comparatively modern times, in Mathematics,
in Natural Philosophy, and in Chemistry, were
fiufficient to have been considered as constituting

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new sciences, with appropi^iate aew titles. But
there was an advantage in retaining the esta-
Uished names ; which possessing the veneration
due to antiquity, imparted a dignity to studies
whid^ were in fact i^ great measure new : and
the greatest innovations met with a more favour-
able reception, from being regarded merely as im-
provements, introduced into sciences whose worth
had long been admitted without dispute : even as
the virtues and achievementsof a manof noble birth
who infinitely surpasses his ancestors, are regarded
with less jealousy than those of an upetart.

The name too of PoUticaUEconomy is mo*t
unfortunately choseA. Interpreted according to
its etymology, it almodt itnpU^ a contradiction.
The branches of science which the Greeks called
woXiriK^ and olxov9fjt4u^ se^da naturally to have re-
ference, respectively, to Waij and olxo^; the one
treating of the affairs Bxid the regulation of a
Commonwealth, the other, originally at least, of
a private family. And in modern popular use,
even much more. Economy is limited, not only to
the private concerns of a family, and not only to
one, and that not the most dignified part of the
regulation of a family, the management of its

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pecuniary concerns, but to the humblest and
most minute portion even of these— the regulation
of daily expenditure. A man is called a good
economist, not for making his fortune by a
judicious investment of his capital in some suc-
cessful manufactory or branch of commerce, but
for making the most of a given incoilie, and
prudently regulating, so as to prevent waste, all
the details of his household expenses.

To those who are habituated to this emjHoy-
ment of terms, the title of Political-Economy is
likely to suggest very confused and indistinct,
and. in a great degree incorrect, notions.

It may be said, indeed, that if a science be of
intrinsic dignity and importance, the appellation
by which it is known is of little consequence j

'• the rose,
" By any other name, would smell as sweet."

But this is true only in respect of such as are, if
not proficients, at least, students, or inquirefs, in
each respective branch of knowledge. To all
others a name which conveys no clear idea of the
nature of the science denoted by it, is not attrac-
tive ; and one which conveys an incorrect idea,

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may even prove repulsive, by exciting groundless
prejudice.

It is with a view to put you on your guard
against prejudices thus created, (and you will
meet probably with many instances of persons
influenced by them,) that I have stated my ob-
jections to the name of Political-Economy. It is
now, I conceive, too late to think of changing it.
A.Smith, indeed, has designated his work a treatise
on the ** Wealth of Nations;" but this supplies
a name only for the subject-matter , not for the
science itself. The name I should have preferred
as the most descriptive, and on the whole least
objectionable, is that of Catallactics, or the
** Science of Exchanges."

Man might be defined, ** An animal that makes
Exchanges :" no other, even of those animals
which in other points make the nearest approach
to rationality, having, to all appearance, the least
notion of bartering, or in any way exchanging
one thing for another. And it is in this point of
view alone that Man is contemplated by Political-
Economy. This view does not essentially differ
from that of A. Smith ; since in this science the
term wealth is limited to exchangeable commo-

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ditie$ ; and it treats of them so far forth only as
tbey are, or are designed to be, the subjects of
exchange. But for this very reason it is perhaps
more convenient to describe Political-Economy as
the science of Exchanges, rather than as the
science of national Wealth, For, the things them-
selves of which the science treats, are immediately
removed from its province, if we remove the possi-
biUty, or the intention, of making them the sub-
jects of exchange ; and this, though they may
conduce, in the highest degree, to happiness,
which is the ultimate object for the sake of which
wedth is sought. A man, for instance, in a desert
island, like Alex. Selkirke, or the personage his ad-
ventures are supposed to have suggested, Robinson
Crusoe, is in a situation of which Political-Eco-
nomy takes no cognizance ; though he might
figuratively be called rich, if abundantly pro-
vided with food, raiment, and various comforts ;
and though he might have many commodities at
hand which would become exchangeable, and
would constitute him, strictly speaking, rich, as
soon as fresh settlers should arrive.

In like manner a musical talent, which is wealth
to a professional performer who makes the exer-
cise of it a subject of exchange, is not so to one

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8

of superior rank , who could not without degrada-
tion 80 employ it. It is, in this last case, theire-
fore, though a source of enjoyment, out of the
province of Political-Economy.

This limitation of the term wealth to things
contemplated as exchangeable, has been objected
to on the ground that it makes the same thing to
be wealth to one person and not to another.
This very circumstance has always appeared to
me the chief recommendation of such a use of
the term ; since even if we determine to employ
the terms Wealth and Value in reference to every
kind of possession, we must still admit, that there
is at least some very great distinction, between the
possession, for instance, of a colleiction of orna-
mental trees, by a nursery-man, who cultivates
them for sale, and by a gentleman, who has
planted them to adorn his ground.

Since however the popular use of the term
Wealth is not always very precise, and since it
may require, just in the outset, some degree of
attention to avoid being confused by contem-
plating the very same thing as being, or not
b^g, an article of wealth, according to circum-
stances, I think it for this reason more conve-
nient (HI the whole to describe Pqlitical-Economy

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as concerned, universaliy, and exclusively, about
exchanges.

It was once proposed indeed to designate it
the *' Philosophy of Commerce;" but this, though
etymologically quite unexceptionable, being in-
deed coincident with the description just given,
is open to the obje<[jtion, that the word Commerce
has been, in popular use, arbitrarily limited to one
class of exchanges.

The only difficulty I can foresee as attendant
on the language I have now been using is one
which vanishes so readily on a moment's reflec-
tion as to be hardly worth mentioning. In many
cases, where an exchange really takes place, the
fact is liable (till the attention is called to it) to be
overlooked, in consequence of our not seeing any
actual transfer from hand to hand of a material
object. For instance, when the copy-right of a
book is sold to a bookseller, the article trans-
ferred is not the mere paper covered with writ-
ing, but the exclusive privilege of printing and
publishing ; it is plain however, on a moment's
thought, that the transaction is as real an ex-
change, as that which takes place between the
bookseller and his customers who buy copies of

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the work. The payment of rent for land is a
transaction of a similar kind.

Having settled then what it is that Political-
Economy is concerned ahout, it might seem
natural to proceed immediately to the develop-
ment of the principles of the science, and the
application of them to the various questions to be
discussed.

But such is the existing state of feeling on the
subject — so numerous are the misapprehensions
that prevail respecting it — and so strong is the
prejudice in many minds against the study — a
prejudice, partly the eflFect, and partly the cause,
of these misapprehensions, that I am compelled,
however reluctantly, to occupy some of your
time in removing objections and mistakes which
stand in the very threshold of our inquiries.
I find myself somewhat in the condition of settlers
in a country but newly occupied by civilized man;
who have to clear land overgrown with thickets —
to extirpate wild beasts — and to secure themselves
from the incursions of savages, before they can
proceed to the cultivation of the soil.

It might seem indeed an insult to your under-
standing, to enter upon a formal apology for

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11

treating of a science, for the cultivation of which
you have accepted the endowment of a Professor-
ship, whose duties you have done me the honour
to entrust to my hands. I have no such inten-
tion : nor do I mean to imply, that those who
now hear me are likely to be imbued with those
vulgar prejudices to which I have alluded. But
you should be prepared to expect and to en-
counter them. Both in the conversation and in
the writings, not only of such as are universally
mere empty pretenders, but of some who on other
subjects shew themselves not destitute of good
sense, of candour, or of information, you will be
likely to meet with such assertions and (intended)
arguments, on this subject, as the very same
persons would treat with scorn, in any other case.
If, therefore, I should appear to any of you to
bestow, either now or hereafter, more attention
than is requisite, on mistakes and absurdities
which may be thought to carry their own refu-
tation with them, I shall intreat you to reflect
how much importance the circumstances of the
case ma)^ attach to objections and errors, in
themselves unworthy of notice. It may be well
worth while to suggest popular answers to pre-

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V2

vailing fallacies, which could never mislead a
man of moderate intelhgence, attention, and
candour, applied to the question ; because the
number is so considerable of those who are
deficient in one or other of these qualities, or in
the exercise of them in a field of inquiry that
may be new to their minds. A mixture of in-

' dolence and self-conceit inclines many a one to
flatter himself, that there can be nothing worth
studying in a subject with which he is un-
acquainted. Many a one is overawed by a Wind
veneration for antiquity, into a conviction that
whatever is true must have been long since dis-
covered ; or by a mistaken view of the design of
Scripture, into an expectation of finding revealed
there, every thing relative to human concerns.
And many again are prone to mistake declama-
tion for argument, and to accept confident asser-
tion and vehement vituperation as a substitute for

L logical refutation.

r In fact, the number of those who are not

only qualified to appreciate justly the force

of arguments, but who are also accustomed to

this employment of their faculties, is probably

i less than is supposed. When a man maintains,

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13

oa several points, opinions whidi are true, \
smd assigod good and sufficient reasons for
them, both he himself, and others, are apt to
conclude at (mce that he is convinced by those
reaeofis : whereas the truth will often be, that he
has tdcen upon trust both the premises and the
conclusion, as well as the connexion between them ;
that he is indolently repeating what he has
heard, without performing any process of reason-
ing in his own mind ; and that if he had not i
been early trained or predisposed, to admit the
conclusion, and it had been presented to him
as a novelty, the arguments which support it,
though in themselves perfectly valid, would have
had little or no weight with him. If such a man
then enters on any new field of inquiry, his
deficiencies at once become apparent. He is in
a situation andogous to that of children taught
by a negligent or unskilful master, who are often
found able apparently to read with great fluency,
in a book they have been accustomed to; though
in reality they are not so much reading, as re-
peating by rote the sentences they have often
gone over ; and if tried in a new book are at a
loss to put two syllables together. -^

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14

Causes such as I have alluded to, and many
others, operate more or less to produce indiflFer-
ence, prejudice, or error, as to the subject now
before us, in the minds of great numbers, whom
you cannot either in prudence or in charity
pass by with disdain, as unworthy of attention.
There are indeed degrees of intellectual or of
moral deficiency, such as to preclude all hope of
eflFecting rational conviction ; but there are also
minor degrees of these obstacles which may be
surmounted by patient assiduity, though not
without. And it should be remembered, that a
cause would be in no very flourishing condition
which should be opposed by all except those who
8^re pre-eminent at once in acuteness, in industry,
and in candour. Nay, some may be brought
to deserve even this very description, who were
at first of a very different character; even as
the illustrious authors of our Reformation, who
listened and replied with unwearied patience to
every objection, found some most zealous and
able coadjutors in men who had for a time been
strenuous upholders of popery,
r* And there is the more encouragement to labour
t perseveringly in the removal of prejudices and the

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15

inculcation of just principles, inasmuch as the great ^
majority of those whom you will find assenting to
the most absurd arguments, and perfectly unmoved
by the strongest, have no such natural incapacity
for reasoning as some might thence infer; but
possess powers which lie dormant for want of
exercise ; and these they may be roused to exert,
when once they are brought to perceive that they
have been accustomed to imagine themselves i
following a course of reasoning, when in fact they
were not. The puerile fallacies which you may
sometimes hear a man adduce on some subjects,
are perhaps in reality no more his own, than the
sound arguments he employs on others ; he may
have given an indolent unthinking acquiescence
to each ; and if he can be excited to exertion of
thought, he may be very capable of distinguishing
the sound from the unsound. -^

Not that after all you must expect even the
clearest explanations and the most unanswerable
arguments, to prove universally successful. Those
who have been too long and willingly enthralled
in the fetters of presumptuous ignorance and
bigotted prejudice, even if driven out of the
house of bondage, which they love, will continue

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wanderers in a wilderness ; but there noay be a
rising generation of more docile mind, who may be
led forward with fairer hopes of ultimate success.
As for the vehement vituperation lavished on
the study of Political-Economy which you will
be prepared to hear, though, of course, not to
answer, I will only ren^ark, that I think it on the
whole no unfavourable sign. Invective is the
natural resort either of those who are incapable
of soimd reasoning altogether, or are at a loss
for arguments to suit their present purpose:
supposing, that is, of course, in each case, as far as
they are not withheld by gentlemanly or Christian
feeling. In proportion therefore as any branch
of study leads to important and useful results —
in proportion as it gains ground in public estima-
tion — in proportion as it tends to overthrow
prevailing errors — ^in the same degree, it may
be expected to call forth angry declamation
from those who are trying to despise what they
will not learn, and wedded to prejudices which
they cannot defend. Galileo probably would
have escaped persecution, if his discoveries could
have been disproved, and his reasonings refuted.
The same spirit which formerly consigned the

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too powerful disputant to the duDgeon or the
stake, is now, thank heaven, compelled to vent
itself in railing ; which you need not more regard
than the hiss of a serpent which has heen de-
prived of its fangs.

Having premised, then, that 1 shall notice
misapprehensions and objections in proportion
not so much to their intrinsic weight, as, to their
prevalence, and the probability of your being
called on to refute them, you will perhaps be
surprised at my mentioning in the first place,
a complaint urged against writers on Political-
Economy for confining their attention to the
subject of Wealth. This sounds very much like
a complaint against mathematicians for treating
merely of quantities ; or against grammarians for
investigating no subject but language. Yet I can
assure you that I have seen the complaint urged
with apparent seriousness, by writers not generally
held in contempt. I believe what is really meant
by some of those who make the complaint, is,
that some writers (A. Smith in particular has
been charged with this) have recommended this
or that measure to be at once adopted^ on the

c

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gro^pd ,of its ccmduping t^ natiQi^l jw^^aUh ; or
have meiasurecj .the whole benefit of each instHu-
,tJLOj;ittr-tl;^e g^bsolute desirableness of each ,ob-
^ect-r-rby this s^tandard alone.

I am inclined to think that in many cases this
has been the fault of the reader more than of the
writer. When an author is avowedly treating,
jB^Kclusively, of questions of profit and loss, the
fair mode of interpretation seems to be, to under-
stand what he says, in reference to the subject in
h^and exclusively. If therefore I find a writer on
Political-Economy treating, for instance, of the
compflirative. merits of diflferenjt modes that have
,been proposed for the attainw^nt of some national
good, and deciding in favour of one of them, Isbould
think myself bound in candour to understand him
as speaking (unless he expressly referred to some
other consideration) of the superiority of that one
in reference to national wealth alone ; and as
not giving any decision as to its absolute ex-
pediency. If this mode of interpretation be not
adhered jto, any one who writes or speaks on any
subject whatever, will be perpetually liable to be
misunderstood ; and that, the more, in propor-
tion to the precision and accuracy with which he

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coi^nes himself to the question before him.
Por iitetanee, a mnn Mvho is employed to measure
twd portions t)f land, delivers in a statement of the
number of acres in «ach, and represents correctly,
{if he has done his work well,) which is the larger.
But if, when he has confined himself to his own
proper business, to the exclusion of all irrelevant
Considerations, he is mistakenly supposed to have
been expressing an opinion as to the comparative
fertility of soil, healthiness of situation, or pic-
turesqtle beauty, of the two estates, the statement
he has made will be likely to mislead in pro-
portion to its real accuracy.

In like manner, when a geometrician states the
ratios of cubes or spheres to each other, though
one may be of teftd and the other of wood, he is
supposed to be taking into consideration, not
their substance and weight, but their magnitude
alone. And so also, if a writer on PoHtical-
Economy is speaking of two articles of wealth
as equal or unequal, be ought reasonably to be
understood as speaking of their exchangeable
vahte, without toudiing on their greater or less
desirableness in other respects. Though one thou-
sand pound's worth of jewels be of the same vcUue

c2

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as one thousand poufid's worth of instructive
books, which must as surely be the case as that
a pound of feathers and a pound of lead are equal
in weight, it does not follow that each must con-
tribute equally to public and private happiness.

If, however, any writer does maintain this, or
in any way asserts or implies that wealth consti-
tutes the sole ground of preference of one thing
over another, and that happiness is best promoted
by sacrificing on each occasion all other con-
siderations to that of profit, he is then deserving
of censure for the doctrine he inculcates ; but it
is remarkable that this censure will be incurred
by a procedure the very opposite of the one
complained of. His fault will have been his not
confining himself to questions relating merely to
wealth, but travelling out of his record, as it is
called, to decide, and decide erroneously, as to
what conduces to public happiness. His proper
inquiry was, as to the means by which wealth
may be preserved or increased ; to inquire how
far wealth i^ desirable ^ is to go out of his proper
province ; to represent it as the only thing de-
sirable, is an error, not in Political-Economy,
but apart from it ; and arises, not from his too

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close adherence to his own subject, but from his
wandering into extraneous discussions.

I could wish, therefore, that the complaint
against Political-Economists of confining them-
selves to the considerations of wealth were better
founded than it is ; for ^ there is nothing thaP
tends more to perplexity and error than the
practice of treating of several different subjects at
the same time, and confusedly, so as to be
perpetually sliding from one inquiry to another,
of different kinds.

Not, however, that I mean at bU to object to
the incidental notice by writers on PoUtical-
Economy of matters closely alHed to, yet forming
no part of, the inquiries properly belonging to
this science. In questions appertaining to any
other branch of politics, or of the philosophy of
the human mind, they may be right, or they may
be wrong, in their conclusions themselves, yet
without introducing any indistinctness and con-
fusion into their own proper course of inquiry,
provided they are but careful to keep the dif-
ferent subjects apart. A digressive discussion, in
«hort, of any point, is not necessarily objection-

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able, if it be so introduced as not tp lose sigtU of
the circumstance that it is a digression.

The same sort of complaint, which I haivre been
speaking of as having been urged againsit tb^^
writers who have treated of this soimce,, haa
sometimesi beea brou^t against the study itself*,
Since wealth, it is urged, is not happiness, and
since it is only one out of the many subjecte
which lawgivers or governors have to consider,,
a science which has wealth for its subject^ is
unworthy of so dignified a title, and beneath tiie.
attention of a philosophical mind : especially^ it
is added, since men are in general prone rathen
to an excess than a deficiency in the pursuit, o^
gain.

To the former part of this objection it may b^
sufficient to reply, that we are more likely tp^
advance in knowledge, by treating of one subjecfc
at a time, than by blending together several disr
tinct inquiries ; though all may centre in; the one.
common ultimate end, of human happiness* Even,
the building and fitting up of a, house is a work,
entrusted to a number of distinct artisans, though*
their labours all tend to one common end, the

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coiDfort of the inhabitant. Much more may it
be expected, that in the pursuit of so complex
an object as human good, universally, our in-
quiries will be as vague and unprofitable as those
of the Platonists after their ct^i rdyMv, unless we
divide them according to the' diflFerent branches
(rf the subject, and keep steadily in view not
merely the general end of them all, but the
immediate end of each. This remark, in sub-
stance, was expressed several years ago, in rfela-
tiott to another subject, by one of our most
illustrious professors, with a neatness and pre-
cision which cannot be surpassed : ** omnium haec
'' est laus artium ut hominum utilitatibus inser-

*' viant atqui non nobis inquirendum est,

** quid omnibus sit commune, sed quid cuique
** proprium."

Whether we choose, after the example of the
Greek philosophers, to speak of the Political
science as having for its object Human Good
universally, or whether We understand Polities'
in the moi^ limited sense which is now the mbi*^
usual, as relating to public affairs contradistiti-
guished from those of iridiVidilals ; in either ciiuse,
Pcflitical-Economy Will be one branch of Politicar

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science ; of which all branches are worthy of at-
tention, and each demands a separate attention.
And as there is no department of knowledge con-
nected with the public welfare, that is undeserv-
ing of attentive study, so, the one now before us
is perhaps the more suitable for an academical
course of instruction in an endowed University,
from the circumstance that it is not, like Law or
the MiUtary art, &c. the subject of a strictly pro-
fessional education. Many of the arts most essen-

Ttial to society, need no artificial stimulus to their
cultivation, because they are such that the success
in life of individuals is clearly connected with
their (real or supposed) proficiency in those
branches of knowledge, by the exercise of which
they are to be maintained. But the regulation
of public affairs, in which most of the higher
and a large proportion of the middle and lower
classes in this country have a greater or less
share, is not an art learned in any course of
regular professional education, but is too often
exercised by those who have to learn it (if they
learn it at all) in practice, from a series of ex-,
periments, of which the nation must abide the

I p^ril. Now it is precisely those branches of

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study, the cultivation of which is expedient for
the public, but to which the self-interest of
individuals would not lead them — ^it is these, I
say, that most demand the attention of a Univer-
sity ; unless at least we suppose them the gift of
nature, or of inspiration.

As for the latter part of the objection above
noticed, that men are akeady too eager in the
pursuit of wealth, and ought not to be encouraged
to make it an object of attention, the mistake on
which it proceeds is one which you will meet
with only in the young, (I mean, either in years,
or in character,) and which you will readily re-
move in the case of those who are even moderately
intelligent and attentive. You may easily explain
to them that Political-Economy is not the art of
enriching an individual, but relates to Wealth
generally ; — to that of a nation, and not to that of
an individual, except in those cases where his
acquisition of it goes to enrich the community.
You may point out to them that wealth has no
more necessary connexion with the vice of coveU
ousnessy than with the virtue of charity ; since it
merely forms the subject-matter about which the
one as well as the other of these i& concerned :

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and that invfestigations relative to the nature,
production) and distribution of wealth, havie no
greater connexion with sordid selfishness, than
the inquiries of t^e chemist and the physiologic^
respecting the^ orgs^s' and the process of dige^
tion and absorption of nutriment^ have with
gUittonousi excess. And you may add, that in-
dividuals the most destitute of systematic know-
ledge, and nations not only ignorant but compara-
tively poor, are at least as prone to avaricer
as any others. The Ardbs are among the'
poor^t, and the most covetous^ of nations ; atid'
most of tbose savage tribes, who have not
even the use of money, are addicted to pilfering-
and pltmder of every thing that is Wealth tt>
them.

T'he mistlake; however, which I have now been
noticing is evidiently the result of such- como
pletfe thoughtlessness, that you will not probably
find it necessary to bestow much pains on its
reftltation.

As for the degree and the manner in which
Wealth is connected with national happiness —
this, as well as the points of contact between* a^
knowledge of this subject, and our moral and

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religious duties — the relation again in which it
stands to Natural-theology^ — and again, the
sources from which our knowledge of it is to be
derived — ^all these are points respecting which
more serious misapprehensions prevail; and
which therefore, requiring to be dwelt on at some-
what greater length, must be reserved for future
Lectures.

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LECTURE IL

IN adverting, as I did in my last Lecture, to the
mistake respecting the branch of knowledge we
are considering, of supposing, that because it
relates to wealth, it must have a tendency to
encourage avarice, I fear I may have appeared
to bestow undue attention on an error too
palpable to be of importance. But I must claim
your indulgence for occupying yet a little more
of your time in suggesting refutations of ob-
jections, which at first sight might seem not
worth refuting, but which you will find by
experience are too prevalent to be in prudence
passed by.

That Political-Economy should have been com-
plained of as hostile to Rehgion, will probably
be regarded a century hence (should the fact
be then on record) with the same wonder, almost
approaching to incredulity, with which we of

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the present day hear of men sincerely opposing,
on religious grounds, the Copemican system.
But till the advocates of Christianity shall have
become universally much better acquainted with
the true character of their religion, than, univer-
sally, they have ever yet been, we must always
expect that every branch of study, every scien-
tific theory, that is brought into notice, will be
assailed on religious grounds, by those who either
have not studied the subject, or who are in-
competent judges of it; or again, who are
addressing themselves to such persons as are
^o circumstanced, and wish to excite and to take
advantage of the passions of the ignorant
*' Flectere si nequeo Superos, Adheronta movebo."
Some there are who sincerely believe that the
Scriptures contain revelations of truths the most
distinct from religion. Such persons procured ac-
cordingly a formal condemnation (very lately re-
scinded) of the theory of the earth's motion,
as at variance with Scripture. In Protestant
countries, and now, it seems, even in Popish, this
point has been conceded ; but that the erroneous
principle — ^that of appeaUng to Revelation on
questions of physical science — has not yet been

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#Q^ely cl^arieii wmy^ is evident from tbe ob-
j^^ijliieps, yflmk m^st of yxm probably may have
iw^d, tP the researches of Geology. The
o^ctipos agWP^st A&tronomy have been abaa-
<ipw4, CTthfBr, perbaps, from its having heen
^aidp tp iappear that the ^ripture accounts of
th^ ^Ji^^ofiae^a of the feeavew Hmy i^ recoBdled
witfe th,e spnclusioas of Science, then from its
hm^ ujiderstood that Scripture is j^ot the test
by iwhich the conclusions of Science are ti9 be
tri^. And accordiogly when ^ttenticHi w;as first
c^^lMd to tfce i^seardifis of Oeplogy, many who
we^p staled at the povejity of some of the
cQ®cipsio»s (Jrawn, and yet were averse to enter
on a mw Ib^ld of study, or found themselves
incspable pf Baaintaining many uotions they had
been iaccufitom^ to acquiesce in^ betook them-^
selves at oiuje to Scripture, and reviled the
stucfents of Geology as hostile to Revelation ;
in the sMCke manner as, in Pagan and Popish
countries, any one who is conscious o( crime
or of debt, flies at once to the altar, and shelters
himself in the sanctuary.

It is true, doctrines may be maintained on")
subjects indeed distinct from religion, but which ;

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I nevertheless would, if admitted, go to invalidate
Scripture. If, for instance, it could be demoa-
strated, that mankind could not possibly have
descended from a single pair, such a conclusion,
no doubt, would go far to shake the foundation
of our religion. But even in such cases, I
would utterly protest against an appeal to Scrip-
ture, as Scripture — I mean, as a series of
inspired writings — with a view to the refutation
of such theories ; not even though we might
begin by establishing generally the claim of these
writings to our beUef. Still, we ought to employ
• them for their own proper purpose ; which is to
reveal to us religious and moral truths. Histo-
rical or physical truths may be estabHshed by
their own proper evidence ; and this, therefore, is
the course we are bound to pursue. A Christian
will indeed feel antecedently a strong persuasion
that such conclusions as I have been speaking of,
or any others which are really inconsistent with
the Bible, never will be established ; that any
theory seemingly at variance with it, will either
be found deficient in evidence, or else reconcile-
able with the Scriptures. But it is not a sign of
Faith— on the contrary, it indicates rather a

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want of faith, or else a culpable indolence, to
decline meeting any theorist on his own ground,
and to cut short the controversy by an appeal
to the authority of Scripture. For if we
really are convinced of the truth of Scripture,
and consequently of the falsity of any theory, (of
the earth, for instance,) which is really at variance
with it, we must needs believe that that theory
is also at variance with observable phenomena ;
and we ought not therefore to shrink from trying
that question by an appeal to these. The
success of such an appeal will then add to the
evidence for the truth of the Scriptures, instead
of burdening them with the weight of defending
every point which they incidentally imply. It;
is for us to ** behave ourselves valiantly for our
country and for the cities of our God,'* instead
of bringing the Ark of God into the field of
battle to fight for us. He will, at all events, we
may be sure, defend his own cause, and finally
lay prostrate the Dagon of infidelity; but we,
his professed defenders, more zealous in reality
for our own honour than for his, shall deserve to
be smitten before the Philistines. -^

I have said, that the object of the Scriptures is

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to reveal to us religious and moral truths ; but
even this, as far as regards the latter, must be
admitted with some modification. God has not
revealed to us a system of morality such as would
have been needed for a Being, who had no other
means of distinguishing right and wrong. On
the contrary, the inculcation of virtue and repro-
bation of vice in Scripture are in such a tone aa
seem to presuppose a natural power, or a capa-
city for acquiring the power, to distinguish them.
And if a man denying or renouncing all claims
of natural conscience, should practise without
scruple every thing he did not find expressly for-
bidden in Scripture, and think himself not bound
to do any thing that is not there expressly en-
joined, exclaiming at every turn,

" Is it so written in the Bond?**

he would be leading a life very unUke what a
Christian's should be. There is no moral formula
more frequently cited, and with more deserved
admiration, than that maxim of doing to others
as we would have them do to us : and, as Paley
observes, no one probably ever was in practice
led astray by it. Yet if we imagine this maxim

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placed before a Being destitute of all moral
faculty, and attempting to learn, from this, what
morality is, he would evidently interpret it as
implying, that we are to do whatever we should
wish for, if in another's place ; which would lead
to innumerable absurdities, and in many cases to
absolute impossibilities ; since, in mahy cases,
our conduct will affect two or more parties, whose
wishes are at variance with each other. A judge,
for instance, before whom there might be a cause
to be tried, would feel that both parties wished,
each, for ia decision in his own favour; which
would be manifestly impossible. But in practice,
every one feels, that what he is bound to do, is,
not necessarily what would be agreeable to his
inclinations, were he in the other's place, but
what he would think he might jiistly and reason-
ably expect. Now this very circumstance implies
his having already a notion of what is just and
reasonable. The use he is to make of the for-
mula, is, not for the acquiring of these general
principles, but for the application of them, in
those cases where self-interest would be the
most likely to blind him.

Since then we are bound to use our own
d2

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36

natural faculties in the search after all truth that
is within the reach of those faculties, most espe-
cially ought we to try by their own proper
evidence, questions which form no part of Reve-
lation properly so called, but which are inci-
dentally alluded to in the sacred writings. If we
appeal to the Scriptures on any such points, it
should be merely as to an ancient book, not in
reference to their sacred character ; in short, not
as Scripture '.

And this, as I have said, holds good even in
respect of such physical or other theories as
would, if received, clearly militate against re-
ligion. They may be, and they therefore should
be, refuted on other grounds. Much less should
we resort to Scripture, as Scripture, in the dis-
cussion of questions not involving the truth of
Christianity. So far however are many persons
from acting on this principle, that the course
they habitually adopt, whenever any opinion is
broached in which they do not concur, is that of
attempting to prove, or still oftener by assuming,
that it is adverse to religion ; thus endeavouring

* See Hinds on Inspiration, p. 152.

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to create an odious association with whatever
they dislike.

What I have said of the Bible's not having
been designed to give such full instruction in
morals as should supersede all other, will not be
thought irrelevant to the present subject, by those
who are aware that Political-Economy has been
actually censured by some, as being connected
with human conduct, and yet not professing to be
drawn from Scripture, In physical science, (it
has been said,) we are to trust our own natural
powers ; but in the regulation of our conduct, the
Bible is the only sure guide ; and a system which
professes an independence of this guide, in human
affairs, is to be regarded as something unholy.

To such objectors (and, however strange it may
seem, you may tneet with such) you may easily
explain, if they can be brought candidly to ex-
amine the character and design of Revelation,
that its object is to fiimish principles — motives —
encouragement — means of assistance-^in the per-
formance of duty ; but no such detailed directions,
even in cases where moral right and wrong are
concerned, as shall supersede the exercise of
reflection, observation, and discretion. You may

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point out to them, for instance, that the Scriptures
enjoin Charity to the poor ; but give no directions
as to the best mode of administering our charity ;
now it is evident that all different modes of attempt-
ing to relieve distress are not equally effectual ;
and that those which are altogether injudicious
may even lead to more suffering than they remedy.
Again, Justice is inculcated in Scripture, as well
as by natural conscience ; but in public affairs
it often happens, that it is public expediency that
determines what particular course is just. It is
just, for instance, that all the individuals of a com-
munity should bear their share of the burden of
contributing to any object essential to the public
good ; but if the object were one beneficial to a
small portion only of the community, it would
be unjust that, these should be benefited at the
expense of all the rest : here therefore the ques-
tion of just and unjust, turns upon that of public
expediency. And on this point errors may easily
arise, by mistaking the interest of a few for that
of the State. '*Qui autem (says Cicero) parti
*' civium consulunt, partem negligunt, rem per-
'' niciosissimam in civitatem inducunt, seditionem
** atque discordiam." No legislator indeed whose

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inte Dtion was upright, would knowingly and de-
signedly sacrifice the public good to that of a
particular party or class of men ; but he may do
so unknowingly, even with the best intentions,
from not perceiving in what way this or that enact-
ment affects the community ; and thus, without
any imjust design, may sanction an unjust mea-
sure. And it may be added, that though free
from the guilt of wilful injustice, he will be much
to blame for doing ignorantly what is in itself
unjust, if that ignorance be the result of careless-
ness or of obstinate prejudice : xa) yoig hr* avrm r^

ayvoeiv KoXi^oviTiv^ eoiv ounog etmi §oxjf rri$ ayyolotg **.

To speak then comprehensively, it is a Chris-
tian duty to do good to our fellow-creatures,
both in their spiritual and in their temporal con-
cerns : and if so, it must be also a duty to study, to
the best of our abihty, to understand in what their
good consists, and how it is to be promoted. To
represent therefore any branch of such study as
inconsistent with Christianity, is to make Chris-
tianity inconsistent with itself. He who should
acknowledge himself bound to feed the hungry
and clothe the naked, and visit the sick and

•» Arist. Eth. b. iii. c. 5.

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prisoners, would not be acting consistently with
his profession, if he should, through inatten-
tion or prejudice, or any other cause, sanc-
tion any measure that tended to increase those
sufferings ; or oppose, or neglect to support, any
that tended to diminish them. The goods of
this world are by no means a trifling concern
to Christians considered as Christians. Whether
indeed we ourselves shall have enjoyed a large
or a small ^hare of them, will be of jio import-
ance to us a hundred years hence; but it will
be of the greatest importance, whether we shall
have employed the faculties and opportunities,
granted to us, in the increase and diffusion of
those benefits among others.

You will hear it said indeed, with undeniable
truth, that wealth is not necessarily a benefit
to the possessor. No more is Uberty, or health;
or strength, or learning. But again you will
also meet with some who contend, that a poor
country is more favourably situated for virtue
than a rich one ; and with others who, without
going this length, maintain, that as with indi-
viduals, so with nations, a certain degree of
wealth is desirable, but an excess, dangerous to

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41

the moral character. Either or both of these
points, you may concede for the present; i. e.
waive the discussion of them, as far as regards
the question concerning the importance of the
study we are speaking of. For if it be granted
that we are to dread as an evil the too great
increase of national wealth, or, that wealth is
altogether an evil; still, it is not the less ne-
cessary to study the nature of wealth, its pro-
duction, the causes that promote or impede its
increase, and the laws which regulate its dis-
tribution. We should go to the fountain-head
of the waters, whether we wish to spread them
abundantly over our land, or to drain them en-
tirely away, or to moderate and direct the irriga-
tion. If wealth, or great wealth, be regarded
as a disease, we should remember that bodily
diseases are made the subject of laborious and
minute inquiry by physicians, as necessary with
a view to their prevention and cure. Formerly,
nearly all practitioners recommended inoculation
with small-pox; though the practice had been
much opposed at its first introduction ; now,
they are almost imanimous in preferring vacci-
nation ; but in any stage of either of the con-

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troversies which arose respecting these modes
of practice, a man would have been thought
insane, who should have questioned the import-
ance of studying the nature, symptoms, and
effects of small-pox.

As for the doctrine itself, that national wealth
is morally mischievous as introducing luxury,
(in the worst sense of the word,) effeminacy, pro-
fligacy of manners, and depravation of principle,
it has been inculcated in a loose declamatory
way, by a great number of moralists, who have
depicted in glowing colours the amiable simpli-
city of character, the manly firmness, and the
purity of conduct, to be met with in nations
that continue in primitive poverty; and the
degeneracy that has ensued in those which have
emerged from this state into one of comparative
wealth. Almost all these writers furnish a strong
confirmation of what has been just advanced ;
viz. that whether wealth be a good or an evil,
or each, according to the amount of it — on any
supposition, it is still no less a matter of im-
portance to examine and carefully arrange the
facts relating to the subject, and to reason ac-
curately upon it, if we would avoid self-contra-

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diction. For you will often find men declaiming
on the evils consequent on wealth, and yet, in the
next breath, condemning or applauding this or
that measure, according to its supposed tendency
to impoverish or to enrich the country. You
will find them not only readily accepting wealth
themselves from any honourable source, and
anxious to secure from poverty their children
and all most dear to them ; (for this might be
refwred to the prevalence of passion over prin-
ciple;) but even ofiering up solemn prayers to
heaven for the prosperity of their native country;
and contemplating with joy a flourishing condition
of her agriculture, manufactures, or commerce;
in short, of the sources of her Wealth. Nor is
even this the utmost point to which you will
find some carry their inconsistency; £Dr you
will meet with objections to PoUtical-Economy,
(meaning thereby either some particular doctrines
maintained by this or that writer, or else, all
systematic attention to the subject,) on the
ground that it has for its object the increase
of wealth, which is hurtful; and again, that a
country which is governed according to its prin-
ciples, is likely to be impoverished by them.

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Now the most erroneous doctrines in Political -
Economy that ever were promulgated, (and very
erroneous ones certainly have prevailed,) can
hardly be chargeable with both these conse-
quences. The same system cannot at once tend
to make us rich, and also to make us poor.

Such inconsistencies as these do not shew so
much an incapacity for correct reasoning, as
(what I believe is much more common) an
unthinking carelessness, and a habit of stringing
together well-sounding sentences, and readily
listening to them, without taking the trouble to
reflect on their meaning. Eloquent declamation
is, to the generality, easier, either to compose,
[^or to follow, than close argument. Seneca's
discourses in praise of poverty would, I have no
doubt, be rivalled by many writers of this Island,
if one half of the revenue he drew from the then
inhabitants of it, by lending them money at high
interest, were proposed as a prize.

I have said that most of the moralists who
have represented wealth as unfavourable to vir-
tue, have been guilty of the inconsistency of also
advocating every measure or institution that
tends to the increase of wealtH. There is one

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remarkable exception, in an author now little

known except by name, but whose writings

attracted great attention in their day; Dr. Mau«

deville; whose Fable of the Bees, or ''Private

Vices public benefits,^^ was received by the

world as a most alarming novelty. The novelty

however was more in the form and tone of the

work, than in the matter of it. He was indeed

a man of an acute and original, though not very

systematic or comprehensive, turn of mind ; but

his originality was shewn chiefly in bringing into

juxtaposition, notions which, separately, had long

been current, (and indeed are not yet quite

obsolete,) but whose inconsistency had escaped

detection.

He is usually believed to have deliberately
designed to reconamend vice. In his second
volume, (which is rather a scarce book, but very
well worth reading,) he most solemnly disclaims
any such intention, and protests, (I must say
with an air of great sincerity,) that his object
was to refute those against whom he was writing,
by a reductio ad absurdum. Of his intentions,
however, we have no means of forming a de-
cisive judgment; nor if we had, would that

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question be to the purpose. It is sufficient to
remark, that he is aiding all along on an
hypothesis, and on one not framed gratuitously
by himself, but furnished him by others; and
on that hypothesis he is certainly triumphant.
That if such and such things are respectively
vices and virtues, as had been represented, and if
national wealth and greatness are desirable, and
if such and such means are conducive to this
object, — then, private vices must be public bene-
fits, — ^is proved to be not only an undeniable,
but almost an identical, proposition. His argu-
ment does not go to shew categorically that vice
ought to be encouraged, but hypothetically, that, if
the notions which were afloat were admitted,
respecting the character of virtue and vice, and
respecting the causes and consequences of wealth,
then national virtue and national wealth must be
irreconcilable ; or, as he expresses it,

** Fools only strive ■
" To make a great, an honest hive:"

and consequently, that of two incompatible ob-
jects, we must be content to take one, or the
other. Which of the two is to be preferred, he

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no where decides in his first volume; in his
second, he solemnly declares his opinion, that
wealth ought to be renouticed, as incompatible
with virtue.

Adam Smith, in his Theory of Moral Senti-
ments, gives an account of this system, contain-
ing some very just remarks, though I do not
think he fully understood Mandeville, partly, per-
haps, from having, as it appears, never met with
this second volume. I will read an extract from
the section, the whole of which is well worth atten-
tive study. It exposes very well many of the
f fallacies which are to be found in the book,
though they are not the author's own, but bor-
rowed from his opponents.

'* Dr. Mandeville considers whatever is done
from a sense of propriety, from a regard to what
is commendable and praiseworthy, as being done
from a love of praise and commendation, or as
he calls it from vanity. Man, he observes, is
naturally much more interested in his own hap-
pmess than in that of others, and it is impossible
that in his heart he can ever really prefer their
prosperity to his own. Whenever he appears to
do so, we may be assured that he imposes upon

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us, and that he is then acting from the same
selfish motives as at all other times. Among
his other selfish passions, vanity is one of the
strongest, and he is always easily flattered and
greatly delighted with the applauses of those
about him. When he appears to sacrifice his
own interest to that of his companions, he knows
that this conduct will be highly agreeable to
their self-love, and that they will not fail to
express their satisfaction by bestowing upon him
the most extravagant praises. The pleasure
which he expects from this, over-balances, in
his opinion, the interest which he abandons in
order to procure it. His conduct, therefore,
upon this occasion, is in reality just as selfish,
and arises from just as mean a motive as upon
any other. He is flattered, however, and he
flatters himself with the belief that it is entirely
disinterested ; since, unless this was supposed, it
would not seem to merit any commendation
either in his own eyes or in those of others. All
public spirit, therefore, all preference of public
to private interest, is, according to him, a mere
cheat and imposition upon mankind ; and that
human virtue which is so much boasted of, and

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wiiich is the occasion of so much emulation
among men, is the mere offspring of flattery
begot upon pride."

** Whether the most generous and public-
spirited actions may not, in some sense, be
regarded as proceeding from self-love, I shall
not at present examine. The decision of this
question is not, I apprehend, of any importance
towards establishing the reality of virtue, since
self-love may frequently be a virtuous motive of
action. I shall only endeavour to shew, that
the desire of doing what is honourable and noble,
of rendering ourselves the proper objects of
esteem and approbation, cannot with any pro-
priety be called vanity."

•* It is the great fallacy of Dr. Mandeville^s
book to represent every passion as wholly
vicious, which is so in any degree and in any
dicection« It is thus that he treats every thing
as vanity, which has any reference either to what
are, or to what ought to be, the sentiments of
others : and it is by means of this sophistry, that
he establishes his favourite conclusion, that pri-
vate vices are public benefits. If the love of

E

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magtiificence, a taste for the elegant arts and
improvements of human life, for whatever is
agreeable in dress, fiimiture, or equipage, for
architecture, statuary, painting, and music, is to
be regarded as luxury, sensuaUty, and ostenta*
tion, even in those whose situation allows, with-
out any inconveniency, the indulgence of those
passions, it is certain that luxury, sensuaUty,
and ostentation are public benefits : since with-
out the qualities upon which he thinks proper
to bestow such opprobrious names, the arts of
refinement could never find encouragement,
and must languish for want of employment.
Some popular ascetic doctrines which had been
current before his time, and which placed virtue
in the entire extirpation and annihilation of all
our passions, were the real foundation of this
licentious system. It was easy for Dr. Man-
deville to prove, first, that this entire conquest
never actually took place among men; and
secondly, that if it was to take place universally,
it would be pernicious to society, by putting an
end to all industry and commerce, and in a
manner to the whole business of human life.
By the first of these propositions, he seemed

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to prove that there was no real virtue, and that
what pretended to be such, was a mere cheat
and imposition upon mankind ; and by the
second, that private vices were public benefits,
since without them no society could prosper or
flomish.

'' Such is the system of Dr. Mandeville, which
once made so much noise in the world, and
which, though, perhaps, it never gave occasion to
more vice than what w^ould have been without
it, at least taught that vice, which arose from
other causes, to appear with more effrontery,
and to avow the corruption of its motives with
a profligate audaciousness which had never been
heard of before**."

The conclusion, however, that private vices
are pubhc benefits, is maintained, as I have said,
by Mandeville, only hypothetically ; viz. on the
assumption, that national wealth is unfavourable
to virtue, and poverty the best security against
conniption of morals. This assumption is the
great principle of his work ; which, I wish to be
remembered, in order that I may be clearly

• Vol. i. p. 545—647, and 553— ,555.
e2

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understood, whenever I may employ, as I probably
shall have occasion to do, for brevity's sake, the
word *' MandevilUans," to denote those who' em-
brace this principle. I do not mean to confine it to
such as assent to every-thing contained in the
book ; nor indeed to such as have read it, or
even heard of it ; much less, to those (if there
be any such) who seriously profess to advocate
vice ; since there is no ground for asserting that
this was even the author's own design; but I
apply the term (for the sake of avoiding circum-
locution) to those who have adopted, from
whatever quarter, the fundamental doctrine on
which the whole argument rests — the incom-
patibility or discordancy of national Wealth, and
Virtue.

In discussing any question that may arise
respecting this doctrine, it is important in the
first place, steadily to keep in mind, what
has been already remarked, that it does not at
all affect the question as to the utility of the
studies we are now considering ; since, whether
wealth be a good, or an evil, or partly both, the
knowledge of all that relates to it is not the less
important. This, self-evident as it is, is usually

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t

lost sight of by the Mandevillians of the present
day; who are accustomed to disparage Political-
Economy, on the ground that an increase of
wealth is rather to be deprecated than sought for.
This, if admitted, is so far from proving that the
subject is unworthy of systematic attention, that
it proves the very contrary. It would indeed
follow, that those particular writers are erroneous,
who recommend any measure to be adopted on
the ground of its conducing to wealth ; but what
is to be shunned, is not less important than what
is to be sought ''. If they were to maintain that
wealth is a thing altogether indiferent, which can
produce neither good nor evil results of any
magnitude, then, and then only, they might infer^
that it is too insignificant to deserve notice.

In fact, the whole question respecting the
desirableness and ultimate advantages or dis-
advantages of wealth, is, as I formerly remarked,
only obliquely and incidentally connected with
Political-Economy ; whose strict object is to
inquire only into the nature, production, and

* Ktci yet^ ret xctxtt iceu retyat^k et^ut 6tofit^et Tn-ov^n^ thtti, kx} tm
vir6><xf*l3ttif6f6%9. Arist. Rhet. ii. 3.

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distribution of wealth; not, its connexion with
virtue or with happiness. In a treatise, for in-
stance, on ship-building, or on navigation, it would
be a digression, (though not a trifling and imper-
tinent one,) if the author should inquire concerning
the advantages and disadvantages of a communi-
cation between countries separated by the sea ;
and how far we should adopt as a maxim the
expression of the poet,

'< Deus abscidit
** Prudens, Oceano dissociabilt
" Terras."

This, I say, would not be an absurd or im-
proper digression, if the author were but careful
to point out, that his own proper subject was, the
construction or management, not the utility, -of
a ship.

Taking care then not to lose sight of the inci-
dental and digressive character of the inquiry,
you may next turn the objector's attention to the
distinction between an individual and a community ^
when viewed as possessing a remarkable share of
wealth. The two cases diflfer immensely, as far a§
the moral effects of wealth are concerned. For, first.

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the most besetting probably of all temptations,
to which a rich man, as such, is exposed, is that
of pride — an arrogant disdain of those poorer
than himself. Now, as all our ideas of great and
small, in respect of wealth, and of every thing else,
are comparative, and as each man is disposed
to compare himself with those around him, it is
plain, the danger of priding one's self on wealth
affects exclusively, or nearly so, an individual
who is rich, compared with his own countrymen ;
Mid especially one who is richer than most of
others in his own walk of life, and who reside in
his own neighbourhood. Some degree of national
pride there may be, connected with national
wealth ; but this is not in general near so much
the foundation of national pride, as a supposed
superiority in valour, or in mental cultivation:
and at any rate it seldom comes into play. An
Englishman who is poor, compared with other
Englishmen, is not likely to be much puffed up
with pride at the thought of belonging to a
wealthy community. Nay, even though he
should actually possess property, which among
the people of Timbuctoo, or the aboriginal Britons,
would be reckoned great wealth, he will be more

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likely to complain of his poverty than to be filled
with self-congratulation at his wealth, if most of
those of his own class are as rich or richer than
himself. And even one who travels or resides
abroad, does not usually regard with disdain (on
the score of wealth at least) those foreigners who
are individually as well oflf in that respect as
himself, though their nation may be poorer than
his. And, oh the other hand, those individuals
who, in a poor country, are comparatively rich,
are quite as much exposed as any to the tempt-
ation of pride.

As for what may be said respecting avarice,
selfishness, worldly-mindedness, &c. it may suf-
fice to reply, that not only (as I have already
remarked) these vices are found as commonly in
poor countries as in rich, but even in the same
country, the poor are not at all less liable to
them than the rich. Those in affluent circum-
stances may be absorbed in the pursuit of gain ;
but they may also, and sometimes do, devote
themselves altogether to Literature, or Science,
or other pursuits, altogether remote from this :
those, on the other hand, who must maintain
themselves by labour or attention to business^

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are at least not less liable to the temptation of
too anxiously taking thought for the morrow.

Luxury again is one of the evils represented
as consequent on wealth. The word is used in
so many senses, and so often without attaching
any precise meaning to it, that great confusion is
apt to be introduced into any discussion in which
it occurs. Without however entering prema-
turely on any such discussion, it may be sufficient,
as far as the present question is concerned, to
point out, that the terms Luxury, and Luxurious,
are considerably modified as to their force, ac-
cording as they are applied to individuals or to
nations. An individual man is called luxurious,
in comparison with other men, of the same com-
munity and in the same walk of life with him-
self : a nation is called luxurious, in reference to
other nations. The same style of living which
would be reckoned moderate and frugal, or even
penurious among the higher orders, would be
censured as extravagant luxury in a day-labourer:
and the labourer again, if he lives in a cottage with
glass windows and a chimney, and wears shoes
and stockings, and a linen or cotton shirt, is not
said to live in luxury, though he possesses what

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would be thought luxuries to a negro-prince. A
rich nation therefore does not necessarily contain
more individuals who live in luxury (according
to the received use of the word) than a poor one;
but it possesses more of such things as would be
luxuries in the poor country, while in the rich
one, they are not. The inclination for self-
indulgence and ostentation, is not necessarily less
strong in poor than in rich nations ; the chief
diflFerence is, that their luxury is of a coarser
description, and generally has more connection
with gross sensuality. Barbarians are almost in-
variably intemperate.

As for the effeminizing eflfects that have been
attributed to national luxury, which has been
charged with causing a decay of national energy,
mental and bodily, no such results appear trace-
able to any such cause. Xenophon indeed
attributes the degeneracy of the Persians to the
inroads of luxury, which was carried, he says,
to such a pitch of effeminacy, that they even
adopted the use of gloves to protect their hands.
We probably have gone as much beyond them,
in respect of the common style of living among
us, as they, beyond their rude forefathers; yet

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it will hardly be maintained that this nation dis«
plays, in the employments either of war or peace,
less bodily or mental energy than our Anglo-
Saxon ancestors. In bodily strength, it has
been ascertained by accurate and repeated ex-
periments, that civilized men are decidedly supe-
rior to savages, and that the more barbarous, and
those who lead a harder life, are generally in-
ferior in this point to those who have made more
approaches to civiUzation. There is indeed, in
such a country as this, a larger proportion of
feeble and sickly individuals ; but this is because
the hardship and exposure of a savage life
speedily destroys those who are not of a robust
constitution. Some there are,- no doubt, whose
health is impaired by an over-indulgent and
tender mode of life; but as a general rule, it
may safely be maintained, that the greater part
of that over-proportion of infirm persons among
us as compared, for instance, with the North
American Indians, owe, not their infirmity, but
their life, to the diflference between our habits
and theirs.

Lastly, one of the most important points (Wf
distinction between individuals and nations in

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respect of wealth, is that which relates to in-
dustry and idleness. Rich men are indeed often
most laboriously and honourably active ; but
they mayy and sometimes do, spend their lives
in such idleness as cannot be found among the
poor, excepting in the class of beggars.

A rich natiouy on the contrary, is always an
industrious nation ; and almost always more
industrious than poor ones.

Without entering therefore prematurely into
the consideration of the manner and degree in
which wealth and industry mutually promote
each other, you may be satisfied with simply
pointing out their connexion; so as to remove
all apprehensions that may be entertained, on
that score, of the demoralizing effects of national
wealth.

Since then the dangers, you may add, at-
tendant on the acquisition or possession of
wealth, have reference chiefly, if not entirely,
to the case of individuals, and to them, not less
in a poor than in a rich community, while
national wealth has little or nothing of such
dangers to counterbalance its advantages; and
since almost every one thinks himself even

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bound, in the case of a private friend, notwith-
standing the dangers thus incurred, to enrich
him, by honourable means, if he has the oppor-
tunity; much more, in the case of that collection
of friends which we call our Country, will a
patriotic spirit lead us to promote national wealth
when it does not interfere with more important
objects.

But is there (it may be asked) any one that
ever seriously doubted this ? Judging from men's
conduct, I should say, No. Many measures
indeed have been advocated, which really tend
to impoverish the country — many opposed, which
tend to enrich it ; but never, on those grounds.
It has been always from their tendency being,
at least professedly, understood to be the reverse.
Mnch lavish expenditure again has often been
recommended for inadequate objects ; but always
on the ground that the object was adequate.
I never heard of any one, even of those who
in theory deprecate the increase of national
wealth as an evil, being consistent enough in
practice to advocate any measure on the ground
that it tends to destroy wealth, and for that
express purpose ; or to oppose a measure on the

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ground that it will too much enrich the country.
The fact is, the declairaers against wealth are,
by their own shewing, mere declaimers, and
nothing more ; who, rather than say nothing,
will say what militates against their own con-
clusions. They recommend or oppose measures,
as conducive, or as adverse, to national wealth :
and then if their arguments are tried by the test
of well-established principles, and they are ex-
horted systematically to study these principles,
and, before they attempt to discuss questions
connected with wealth, to bestow a regular at-
tention on the subject, they turn round and
inveigh against such a study because it has wealth
for its subject, and wealth is a pernicious thing :
which would not lessen the importance of such
studies, if it were true ; and which they them-
selves have practically admitted, is not true.
They resemble the Harpies of Virgil, seeking to
excite disgust at the banquet, of which they are
nevertheless eager to partake. And as soon as
one set of objections are refuted, the same as-
sailants are ready to renew their clamorous
at^tack from an opposite and unexpected
quarter :

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" Rursuiu ex diverso casli, caecisque latebris,

*' Turba sonans, pedibus prsedam circumvolat unois;

" Polluit ore dapes.*'

I can suggest no argument by which you can""[
either convince those who care nothing for self-
contradiction, or silence those who are bent on the i
display of mere eloquence.

" Neque vim plumis ullam, nee yulnera tergo
•* Adcipiunt." '

But for the sake of others, I have endeavoured to \
point out how you may clear away some of the fal-
lacies thus scattered at random ; and which, though
mutually destructive of each other, may cause
impediments in the student's path to knowledge :
even as the wreaths of snow tossed about for-^
tuitously by the bUnd fury of the winds, may
form serious obstructions in the roads. _

On these grounds it may not be beneath your
attention to explain fully some of the most obvious
truths, which have thus become accidentally
obscured; — to bestow some pains in distinctly
setting forth even a proposition in itself so simple,
as, that national wealth, which, even if it were a
serious evil, would demand serious attention, is

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universally, and even by those who declaim
against it, considered as a good.

After aU, indeed, in regard to wealth, as well
as all those objects which the great moralist of
antiquity places in the class of things good in
themselves, {d7F>Jo$ ayaSciy) more depends, as he
himself remarks, on the use we make of these
bounties of Providence than on the advantages
themselves. But they are in themselves food ;
and it is our part, instead of affecting ungratefully
to slight or to complain of God's gifts, to en-
deavour to make them goods to us, {rifMv uyaioiy) by
studying to use them aright, and to promote,
through them, the best interests of ourselves and
our fellow-creatures.

I shall hereafter, when I come to treat of
PoUtical-Economy as connected with Natural-
Theology, enter rather more fully into the con-
sideration of the effects on society which have
been produced, and of those which we may con-
clude were designed to be produced, by the
progress of wealth ; and also of the causes by
which that progress, as well as the several effects
of it, have been modified, promoted, or im-
peded.

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In my next Lecture, however, I shall be com-
pelled to occupy your time with the notice of
some of the mistakes that prevail respecting the
study itself of PoUtical-Economy, distinct from
those relating to wealth which is the subject of it;
and to the objections that have in consequence
been raised, not against the pursuit of national
wealthy but against the scientific contemplation of
the subject.

rfVMi^

;^AJ^ ^.^ <'A>

Library.

S^ Calif otn\?v.

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LECTURE III.

Supposing wealth to be naturally , and con-
sequently to have always been, an object of suffi-
ciently strong desire to mankind, what need can
there be, it may be said, to construct a Science,
and an Art founded on that Science, relative to
the subject? In a matter about which daily
practice and daily observation are concerned, and
have been, for so many ages, must not the
common sense of judicious men, and the experi-
ence of practical men, be preferable to the subtle
systems of theoretical speculators ?

Some again there are, who are far from re-
garding with disdain the systematic study of the
theory of wealth, who yet have no idea of
reckoning it an important part of general educa-
tion ; but as one necessary, perhaps, or useful, to
those at the head of public affairs ; and to any
others, a matter of mere curious speculation.

f2

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With respect to the prevaihng fallacies con-
nected with the term Common-sense, I have
elsewhere remarked, that all who employ it with
any distinct meaning, intend to denote hy it
*• an exercise of the judgment unaided by any
art or system of rules ; such as we must neces-
sarily employ in numberless cases of daily oc-
currence ; in which, having no established prin-
ciples to guide us — ^no line of procedure, as
it were, distinctly chalked out — we must needs
act on the best extemporaneous conjectures we
can form. He who is eminently skilfiil in doing
this, is said to possess a superior degree of
common- sense. But that common-sense is only
our second-best guide — that the rules of art, if
judiciously framed, are always desirable when
they can be had, is an assertion, for the truth
of which I may appeal to the testimony of man-
kind in general; which is so much the more
valuable, inasmuch as it may be accounted the
testimony of adversaries. For the generality
have a strong predilection in favour of common-
sense, except in those points in which they,
respectively, possess the knowledge of a system
of rules ; but in these points they deride any

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one who trusts to unaided common-sense. A
sailor, for instance, will, perhaps, despise the
pretensions of medical men, and prefer treating
a disease by common-sense: but he would ri-
dicule the proposal of navigating a ship by
common-sense, without regard to the maxims
of nautical art. A physician, again, will per-
haps contemn systems of Political-Economy, of
Logic, or Metaphysics, and insist on the superior
wisdom of trusting to common-sense in such
matters ; but he would never approve of trusting
to common-sense in the treatment of diseases.
Neither, again, would the architect recommend
a reliance on common-sense alone in building,
nor the musician in music, to the neglect of
those systems of rules, which, in their respective
arts, have been deduced from scientific reasoning
aided by experience. And the induction might
be extended to every department of practice.
Since, therefore, each gives the preference to
unassisted common-sense only in those cases
where he himself has nothing else to trust to,
and invariably resorts to the rules of art, where-
ever he possesses the knowledge of them, it is
plain that mankind universally bear their testi-
mony, though unconsciously and often unwill-

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ingly, to the preferableness of systematic know-
ledge to conjectural judgments.

'* There is, however, abundant room for the
employment of common-sense in the application
of the system **."

It may be added, that what was said in respect
of Logic, holds good no less in the present
subject, and indeed in most others ; viz. that/ in

Tthe practical application of scientific principles
there is abundant room for the employment of
common-sense "".

There is no fear that we shall ever in practice
have too little call for deliberation — too little
need of judicious conjecture. Science does not
enable us to dispense with common-sense, but
only to employ it more profitably ; nor does the
best-instructed man necessarily deliberate the
less ; only he exercises his deliberation on dif-
ferent points from those that occupy the less-
instructed; and to better purpose; he does not
waste his mental powers in conjectures as to his

' road, when he has a correct map in his hand;

^ Logic, p. xiv — xvi.

^ B»vXtv»fit6« 9f ^£XX69, says Aristotle, %t^} r^ ri^cvut i rtkf

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but he still has abundance of other inquiries to i
make as he travels over it. The adoption of the
Arabic numerals and of the Algebraic symbols
does not supersede calculation, but extends its
sphere.

With respect to Experience again, which has
been made the occasion of so much fallacy, by a
careless and inaccurate mode of appealing to it,
I have elsewhere remarked, that '* in its original
and strict sense. Experience is applicable to the
premises from which we argue, not to the in-
ference we draw. Strictly speaking, we know by
experience only the pasty and what has passed
under our own observation ; thus, we know by
experience that the tides have daily ebbed and
flowed, during such a time ; and from the tes-
timony of others as to their own experience, that
they have formerly done so ; and from this experi-
ence, we conclude, by induction, that the same
phenomenon will continue ^'.^^

And I have remarked, in another place, " that
men are apt not to consider with sufficient at-
tention, what it is that constitutes experience
in each point ; so that frequently one man shall

*= Rhetoric, p. 73.

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have credit for much experience, in what relates
to the matter in hand, and another, who, per-
haps, possesses as much, or more, shall be
underrated as wanting it. The vulgar, of all
ranks, need to be warned, first, that time alone
does not constitute experience ; so that many
years may have passed over a man's head, with-
out his even having had the same opportunities
of acquiring it, as another, much younger:
secondly, that the longest practice in conducting
any business in one way, does not necessarily
confer any experience in conducting it in a different
way ; for instance, an experienced husbandman,
or minister of state, in Persia, would be much
at a loss in Europe ; and if they had some things
less to learn than an entire novice, on the other
hand they would have much to unlearn: and,
thirdly, that merely being conversant about a
certain class of subjects, does not confer experi-
ence in a case where the operations, and the end
proposed, are different. It is said that there was
an Amsterdam merchant, who had dealt largely
in com all his life, who had never seen a field of
wheat growing; this man had doubtless acquired,
by experience, an accurate judgment of the quali-

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ties of each description of corn,— of the best
methods of storing it,— of the arts of buying
and selling it at proper times, &c. ; but he would
have been greatly at a loss in its cultivation ;
though he had been, in a certain way, long con-
versant about corn. Nearly similar is the ex-
perience of a practised lawyer, (supposing him
to be nothing more,) in a case of legislation;
because he has been long conversant about law^
the unreflecting attribute great weight to his
judgment ; whereas his constant habits of fixing
his thoughts on what the law is, and withdraw-
ing it from the irrelevant question of what the
law ought to be ; — ^his careful observance of a
multitude of rules, (which afford the more scope
for the display of his skill, in proportion as they
are arbitrary, unreasonable, and unaccountable,)
with a studied indifference as to, that which is
fDreign from his business, the convenience or in-
convenience of those rules, — ^may be expected to
operate unfavourably on his judgment in ques-
tions of legislation: and are likely to counter-
balance the advantages of his superior know-
ledge, even in such points as do bear on the
question.

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"In matters connected ifvith Political-Economy,
the experience of practical men is often appealed
to in opposition to those who are called theorists;
even though the latter perhaps are deducing
conclusions from a wide induction of facts, while
the experience of the others will often be foimd
only to amount to their having been long con-
versant with the details of office, and having all
that time gone on in a certain beaten track, from
which they never tried, or witnessed, or even
imagined, a deviation.

'* So also the authority derived from expe-
rience of a practical miner, i. e. one who has
wrought all his life in one mine, will sometimes
delude a speculator into a vain search for metal
or coal, against the opinion perhaps of theorists^
i. e. persons of extensive geological observation^."
It may be added, that/there is a proverHal
r maxim which bears witness to the advantage
sometimes possessed by an observant by-stander
over those actually engaged in any transaction.
'* The looker-on often sees more of the game
than the players." Now the looker-on is pre-
/ cisely (in Greek Geeogog) the theorist.

'^ Rhetoric, part ii. ch. iii. §. 5.

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When then you find any one contrasting^ in/
this and in other suhjects, what he calls experi-
ence, with theory, you will usually perceive on
attentive examination that he is in reality com-
paring the results of a confined, with that of a
wider, experience ; — a more imperfect and crude
theory, with one more cautiously framed, and
based on a more copious induction. J

It has been remarked by physicians, that no
patient or nurse, however conscious of ignorance
in medicine, and disavowing all design to theo-
rize, can ever be brought to give such a descrip-
tion of any case of sickness as shall involve no
theory, but shall consist merely of a statement of
what has actually presented itself to their senses.
They will say, for instance, that the patient was
disordered in consequence of this or that ; — that he
obtained relief /rom such and such an application,
&c. all which is, in reality, theory. And hence
medical writers very prudently inculcate a caution
to the practitioner, to ascertain what are the habi-
tual notions of his informant, in order that he
may interpret aright the descriptions given. The
fact is, that (not in what relates to medicine
alone, but in all subjects) men are so formed

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as (often unconsciously) to reason, whether well or
ill, on the phenomena they observe, and to mix
up their inferences with their statements of those
phenomena, so. as in fact to theorize (however
scantily and crudely) without knowing it. If
you will be at the pains carefully to analyze the
simplest descriptions you hear of any transaction
or state of things, you will find, that the process
which almost invariably takes place is, in logical
language, this ; that each individual has in his
mind certain major-premises or principles, relative
to the subject in question; that observation of
what actually presents itself to the senses, sup-
plies minor-premises ; and that the statement
given (and which is reported as a thing expe-
rienced) consists in fact of the conclusions drawn
from the combinations of those premises.

Hence it is that several different men, who
have all had equal, or even the very same, ex-
perience, i. e. have been witnesses or agents in
the same transactions, will often be found to re-
semble so many different men looking at the
same book; one perhaps, though he distinctly
sees black marks on white paper, has never
learned his letters; another can read, but is a

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stranger to the language in which the book is |
written; another has an acquaintance vf\\h the
liuiguage, but understands it imperfectly; another
is familiar with the language^ but is a stranger to
the subject of the book, and wants power, or
previous instruction, to enable him fully to take
in the author's drift ; while another again per-
fectly comprehends the whole.

The object that strikes the eye is to all of'
these persons the same ; the difference of the im-
pressions produced on the mind of each is refer-
able to the differences in their minds* -J

And this explains the fact, that we find so
much discrepancy in the results of what are
called Experience and Common-sense, as contra-
distinguished from theory. In former times men
knew by experience, that the earth stands still,
and the sun rises and sets. Common-sense
taught them that there could be no antipodes,
since men could not stand with their heads down-
wards, Uke flies on the cieling. Experience
taught the King of Bantum that water could not
become soUd. And (to come to the consideration
of human affairs) the experience and common-
sense of one of the most observant and intelligent

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of historians, Tacitus, convinced him, that for a
mixed government to be so framed as to combine
the elements of Royalty, Aristocracy, and De-
mocracy, must be next to impossible, and that if
such a one could be framed, it must inevitably
be very speedily dissolved.

*' Sed quid sequar ? aut quern V*

In points wherein all men agree, they may
possibly be all in the right ; but where they are
utterly at variance, some at least must be mis-
taken.

The illustrations, however, which I have given
from other subjects are extremely inadequate ;
for I know of none in which so much theory,
and that, most paradoxical theory, has been in-
corporated with experience, and passed off as a
part of it, as in matters concerning Political-Eco-
nomy. Tliere is no other in which the most
subtle refinements of a system (to waive, for the
present, the question as to its soundness) have
been, not merely admitted, but admitted as the
dictates of common-sense. Many such para-
doxes, as I allude to, (whether true or false, we
will not now consider,) you may meet with in a

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variety of authors of the present, but much more
of the last and preceding centuries ; and may not
unfrequently hear in conversation. That a state
of war is favourable to national prosperity — that
it is advantageous to a nation to export goods of
more value than it receives in return — that we
are losers by purchasing articles where we can
get them cheapest — that it is wise for a people
to pay, on behalf of a foreign consumer, part of
the price for which he purchases their com-
modities — that it is better to obtain the same
results by much labour than by little — that a
man is a benefactor to the community by building
himself a splendid palace — and many other doc-
trines that are afloat, may be truths, but they are
at least paradoxical truths ; they may be abstruse
and recondite wisdom; at any rate, they are
abstruse and recondite; — ^they may be sense, but
at least they are not common-sense.

And again, many conclusions maintained by
men who have had much experience, of one kind
or other, though they may be just conclusions, yet
cannot be said to have been brought to the test of
experience. For instance, that a country would
be enriched, by having, what is called, a favour-

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able balance of trade with all the world, i. e. by
continually exporting more in value than the goods
it imports, and consequently receiving the overplus
year by year in money, and exporting none of
that money — ^this has been held by a great number
of men, long conversant with public affairs, and
so far, men of experience. But the doctrine
itself, whether true or false, cannot be said to
have been established by experience, because
the experiment has never been tried. Many,
indeed, have tried, for ages together, to bring
about such a state of things ; but as it is noto-
rious, that they have never succeeded — that no
country ever has been so circumstanced —
the experiment cannot be said to have ever been
tried what would be the consequences of attaining
such ail object ; nor can they therefore be said,
(however right they may be as to the desirable-
ness of the object,) to know by experience that
it is conducive to prosperity. Such experiments,
therefore, are like those of the Aldiemists, who
did indeed try innumerable, with a view to
discover the philosopher's stone; but cannot
be said to have tried the experiment, whether
that stone which converts all things into gold.

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is, or is not, a universal medicine. That it is
possible to find a method of transmuting metals,
and that it would be connected with the art of
healing, has never been disproved ; but one who
believes this, however rightly, cannot be said to
found his belief on experience.

If, again, you should be told, that those who
have long been conversant about any subject
are likely to have exhausted it — to have ascer-
tained all that can be ascertained in it, and to
have introduced every practicable improvement —
and if you are called on to produce instances to
the contrary, you cannot perhaps employ better
than the introduction of so seemingly obvious
and simple a contrivance as that of the Arabic
numerals^ after so many ages during which in-
genious men had been devoting their lives to the
search after improvements in calculation. This
is an instance of an Invention: a similar one
of a Discovery, is that of the circulation of the
bkkid, by Hervey ; who came after such a multi-
tude of physicians, occupied all their lives with
the study of the animal frame, and in the daily
habit of feeling the pulse. Neither of these
novelties were struck out, like the improvements

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in some sciences, through the aid of new instru-
ments, or the casual discovery of new substances.
Both lay, as it were, under our feet ; and yet for
how many ages were they missed by common-
sense, and experience, and science, both separate
and united !

I have dwelt at greater length than perhaps
may have appeared necessary, on some of the
topics which you may have occasion to employ
against the vague notions that are afloat respect-
ing common-sense and experience ; and by which
you may shew the preferableness of systematic
study, to judgments either founded on extem-
poraneous conjecture, or distorted by popular
prejudice; — topics by which (to recur to a former
illustration) men may be incited to learn to read
the great book of human transactions which is
before them, and to read it according to its true
sense, not perverted by a blind acquiescence
in the interpretation of unskilful commentators*
But you must not expect that reason will univer-
sally make its way: ** remedia,^' says the medical
aphorism, ** non agunt in cadaver:'' those in
whom indolence is combined with pride, .will be
induced, by the one, to remain in their position^

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and, by the other, to fortify it as well as they
can.

I shall proceed to oflFer a few remarks on that
very prevailing idea, that Political -Economy is a
subject which may be studied by any one whose
taste particularly leads him to it, but which (with
the exception perhaps of a few who take a leading
part in public affairs) may safely be disregarded
by the generality, as by no means necessary to
make up the character of a well-educated man.

It may perhaps be conceded, that each should
regulate his studies according to his own judg-
ment and inclination, provided he will consent to
refrain from taking a part in matters to which he
has not directed his attention : but this at least
seems an equitable condition: *' Ludere qui nescit,
campestribus abstinet armis." It is a condition,
however, which in the present subject is very
little observed. The most difficult questions in
Political-Economy are every day discussed with
•the most unhesitating confidence, not merely by
empty pretenders to Science, (for that takes
place, and must be expected, in all subjects,) but
by persons not only ignorant, but professedly
ignorant, and designing to continue so, of the

g2

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whole subject; — neither having, nor pretending
to have, nor wishing for, any fixed principles by
which to regulate their judgment on each point.
Questions concerning taxation, tithes, the na-
tional debt, the poor-laws — the wages which
labourers earn, or ought to earn, — the compara-
tive advantages of difierent modes of charity, and
numberless others belonging to PoUtical-Eco-
nomy, and many of them among the most diffi-
cult, and in which there is the greatest diversity
of opinion, are debated perpetually, not merely at
public meetings, but in the course of conversa-
tion, and decisions of them boldly pronounced, by
many who utterly disclaim having turned their at-
tention to Political-Economy. The right manage-
ment of public afiairs in respect of these and such
Kke points, is commonly acknowledged to call for
men of both powerful and well-cultivated mind ;
and yet if every man of common sense is competent
to form an opinion, at the first. glance, on such
points, without either having made them the
subject of regular study, or conceiving that any
such is requisite, it would follow that the art of
government (as far at least as regards that exten-
sive and multifarious department of it, pertaining

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to National Wealth) must be the easiest of all
arts; — easier than even the common handicraft
trades, in which no one will knowingly employ a
man who has not been regularly taught. And
the remark of the Chancellor Oxenstiern to his
son, " quam parva sapientia regitur mundus,"
must be understood to apply not only to what is,
but to what ought to be, the state of things.

Many of you probably have met with thel
story of some gentleman, (I suppose it is usuaUy
fathered on a native of a neighbouring island,)
who, on being asked whether he could play on
the violin, made answer, that he really did not
know whether he could or not, because he had
never tried. There is at least more modesty in
this expression of doubt, than those shew, who,
having never tried to learn the very rudiments of
PoUtical-Economy, are yet quite sure of their
competence to discuss its most difficult questions-j

You may perhaps wonder how it is that men
should conceal from themselves and from each
other so glaring an absurdity- I believe it is
generally in this way: they profess and intend to
keep clear of all questions of PoUtical-Economy;
and imagine themselves to have done so, by

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having kept clear of the names. The subjects
which constitute the proper and sole province of
the science, they do not scruple to submit to
extemporaneous discussion, provided they but
avoid the title by which that science is commonly
designated. This is as if the gentleman in the
story just aUuded to had declared his inability
to play on the violin, at the same time express-
ing his confidence that he could play on the
fiddle.

To the name of Political-Economy , I have al-
ready expressed my objection ; but the subjects
of which it treats are such as are of deep interest
to most men ; and what is more, they are sub-
jects on which most men will form opinions^
whether well or ill founded ; and opinions very
far from unanimous ; and will act on those opi-
nions, whether in their own immediate manage-
metit of public afiairs, or in their choice of
persons to be entrusted with the charge. That
which most men therefore mill do, whether well
or ill, it must be of the utmost importance they
should be quaUfied for doing well ; by collecting,
arranging, and combining whatever general pro-
positions on the subject can be well established.

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You will find, however, that many understand
by Political-Economy, certain particular doctrines
maintained by this or that writer on the subject ;
and that those who profess to dislike Political-
Economy, mean really, such and such doctrines.
You may meet with some again, who, with rather
a greater appearance of precision, find fault with
what they call the modem school of Political-
Economy; and this, when perhaps in the next
breath they are complaining that the modern
writers on the subject are very much at variance
with each other, as to the most important prin-
ciples, and that there are almost as many dif-
ferent schools or sects as there are writers: ** Quo
teneam vultus mutantem Protea nodo ?"

Such trifling as this would not be worth no-
ticing on any other subject ; but on this, you
will find that it is wonderfully tolerated ; and that
accordingly full advantage has been taken of the
toleration.

What is the modern school of Political- Eco-
nomy, I cannot distinctly ascertain; nor (it is
evident) can those who find fault with it ; since
one of their complaints is, that no such thing
exists, and that, on the contrary, the greatest

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discrepancy prevails between the different authors
who profess to teach the science. If there be,
however, any points on which, notwithstanding
their general discrepancy, most of these writers
agree, that is certainly a strong presumption that
they are right in those points. It is, however,
only a presumption ; not a decisive argument ;
since we know, that there are several points in
which various philosophers agreed for many ages,
yet in which it has since appeared they were all
mistaken.

In fact, however, it will be found, that even
much greater discrepancy than is alleged, does exist
among political-economists, if we include, as we
certainly ought to do, under that description, not
merely those who usually bear the appellation, but
all who discuss, and in practice decide, questions
connected with national wealth ; — all who recom-
mend or adopt measures which have that object
in view. All such are, properly, poUtical-econo-
mists; though many of them may be very bad
ones. Those of them who may have never
carefully and systematiclally studied the subject^
whether they are in consequence the less likely,
or the more likely, to arrive at right conclusions.

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yet do adopt sqme conclusions* and act upon
them. Now a man is called a Legislator who
frames and enacts laws, whether they be wise or
unwise ; — whether he be by nature, or by his
studies, well or ill qualified for his task. A man
who attends sick persons, and prescribes for them,
is called a Physician, whether he prescribe skil-
fully or not, and whether he have carefully, or
negligently, studied anatomy, pharmacy, and
nosology. So also, men are usually called Gene-
rals, and Magistrates, who are entrusted, respec-
tively, with the command of armies, and with
the administration of justice; however incom-
petent they may be to those offices : else we
should never speak of an unskilful General, or an
ignorant Magistrate. And on the same principle,
one who forms opinions, and frames or discusses
measures, relative to the matters we are now
speaking of, is a Political-Economist ; though he
is likely to be a bad one, if he does so igno-
rantly, and at random. But in respect of this
particular case of Political-Economy, many men
are in the condition of the Bourgeois of Moliere,
who had been talking prose all his life without
knowing it.

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And yet he who confines the term Political-
Ek^onomy to such and such particular doctrines,
and because he does not assent to these, professes
to disapprove of Political-Economy, would per-
haps exclaim against the absurdity of one who
should declare his abhorrence of Theology ;
meaning thereby the works of Bellarmine, or of
the School-men ; and defending this use of lan-
guage, on the ground that these were celebrated
theological writers.

There is, in fact, no way of keeping clear of
PoUtical-Economy, however we may avoid the
nam€y but by keeping clear of the subjects of it.
And if it be felt as inconsistent with the character
of a well-educated man to have nothing to say, and
to shew no interest, on those subjects, you may
easily make it clear to any man of ingenuous
mind, that he ought to be still more inwardly
ashamed (though. he may not be put to shame
openly) at discussing them, without having taken
due pains to understand them. Specious and
shallow declamation may indeed for a time be
even more favourably received by the unthinking
than sound reasoning, based on sound know-
ledge; but this last must have a tendency to

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prevail ultimately. And you may add, that con-
sequently that man most especially who is alive
to the interests of Religion, ought to take the
more anxious care that this advantage be not .
left exclusively in the hands of its enemies. As
the world always in fact has been, and must be,
governed by political-economists, whether they
have called themselves so or not, and whether
skilful or unskilful; so, there must always be a
\tendency, in a country where all stations are open
to men of superior qualifications — there must al-
ways, I say, be a tendency, in proportion as intel-
lectual culture spreads, towards the placing of this
power in the hands of those who have the most
successfully studied the subject. Now if such a
state of things were to be brought about , as that none
of these should be friendly to Christianity, which
would be the case, if all the friends of Christianity
should refuse to enroll themselves in the number,
it is easy to foresee what must be the con-
sequence. This truism, as it appears when
formally stated, is often overlooked in practice.
If the eflforts of the Romish Church, to represent
the cultivation of astronomy as adverse to re-
ligion, had proved successful, and consequently

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DO Christian bad been an astronomer, the result
produced by themselves, viz. that no astronomer
would have been a Christian, would have been
triumphantly appealed to in justification of their
censures.

But what Aristotle says of Dialectics and
Rhetoric, that all men partake of them in a
certain degree, since all occasionally aim (whether
skilfully or unskilfully) to accomplish the objects
of those arts — this, will in a great degree apply,
in such a country as this, to Political-Economy.
Many are compelled, and most of the rest are
led by their own inclination, to take some part,
more or less, in the questions pertaining to it.
The chief distinction is between those who do
and those who do not, proceed on fixed and
carefully ascertained principles.

I wish for my own part there were no such
thing as Political-Economy. I mean not now
the mere name of the study : but I wish there
had never been any necessity for directing our
attention to the study itself. If men had always
been secured in person and property, and left at
full liberty to employ both as they saw fit ; and
had merely been precluded from unjust inter^

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ference with each other — ^had the most perfect
freedom of intercourse between all mankind been
always allowed — had there never been any wars —
nor (which in that case would have easily been
avoided) any taxation — then, though every ex-
change that took place would have been one of
the phenomena of which Political-Economy takes
cognizance, all would have proceeded so smoothly,
that probably no attention: would ever have been
called to the subject. The transactions of society
would have been like the play of the lungs, the
contractions of the muscles, and the circulation
of the blood, in a healthy person ; who scarcely
knows that these functions exist. But as soon
as they are impeded and disordered, our attention
is immediately called to them. Indeed one of
these functions did exist for several thousand
years before it was even suspected. It is probable
that (except perhaps among a small number of
curious speculators) anatomy and physiology
would never have been thought of, had they not
been called for in aid of the art of medicine ; and
this, manifestly, would have had no existence,
but for disease. In like manner it may be said
to have been diseases, actual or apprehended—-

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evils or imperfections, real or imaginary, that in
the first instance directed the attention of men to
the subjects about which Political-Economy is
conversant: the attention, I mean, not only of
those who use that term in a favourable sense,
but of those no less who hold it in abhorrence,
and of our ancestors who never heard it. Many,
no doubt, of those evils have been produced or
aggravated by the operation of erroneous views
of PoUtical-Economy ; just as there are many
cases in which erroneous medical treatment has
brought on, or heightened diseases ; but in these,
no one will deny that it is from correct medical
views we must hope for a cure.

And you may add this remark; that the greater
part of those who do in this way induce disease, are
such as make no pretensions to the medical art,
nor entertain any respect for it; they are often the
foremost to declaim against the folly of trusting in
physicians — of dosing one's self with medicines^
of tampering with the constitution ; and think them-
selves secure from any such folly, as long as they
abstain from the use of any thing that is called a
medicine; while perhaps they are actually tam-
pering with their constitution by an excessive use

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of spirituous liquors, or of other stimulants, not
bearing the name of medicines, but not the less
powerful in their effects on the human frame..
In like manner, you may observe, many have
ventured boldly on measures tending to produce
the most important results on national wealth,
without suspecting that these had any thing to do
with Political-Economy, because the name of the
science was carefully avoided. Buonaparte de-
tested that name. When he endeavoured by
all possible means to destroy the commerce of
the continent with this country — means which
brought on ultimately the war which ended in
his overthrow — there is no doubt he believed
himself to be not only injuring us, but consulting
the best interests of his own dominions. Indeed,
the two ideas were with him inseparable; for all
that he himself had ever acquired having been at
the expense of others, he could not understand
how we could gain, except by their loss. Yet all
the while, he was in the habit of saying that
Political-Economy, if an empire were of granite,
would crumble it to dust. That erroneous Poli-
tical-Economy may do so, he evinced by the
experiment he himself tried : but to the last he

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was not aware that he had been in fact practising
such a system: — had been practising Political-
Economy in the same sense in which a man is
said to be practising Medicine, unskilfully, who
through ignorance prescribes to his patient a
poisonous dose.

From whatever causes then evils or incon-
veniences may have sprung, you may easily
explain, that the remedy or mitigation of them
must be sought in a correct and well-digested
knowledge of the subject.

But how much soever we may lament that
those evils should ever have existed, to which
probably the art and the science of Political-
Economy owe their origin — which led, first to
the practice, and many ages after to the study,
of it — we must not regard the study itself as
therefore no more than a mere necessary evil ;- —
as having in itself nothing of the character of an
interesting or dignified pursuit. Anatomy and
Physiology, though, as I have said, they probably
owe their rise to Medicine, as that did to disease,
are yet universally acknowledged to be among
the most curious and interesting studies, even
for those who have no design to apply them

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^ ^^^f Calif oTn\»

professionally in the practice of medicine. In
particular, they are found, the more they are
studied, to throw more and more light on the
stupendous wisdom of contrivance which the
structure of organized bodies displays; — ^in short,
to furnish a most important portion of Natural
Theology. And it might have^ been anticipated,
that an attentive study of the constitution of
Society, should bring to light a no less admirable
apparatus of divinely-wise contrivances, directed
no less to beneficial ends ; — that as the structure
of a single bee is admirable, and still more so that
of a hive of bees, instinctively directing their
eflforts towards a common object, so, the Divine
Maker of the human body, has evinced no less
benevolent wisdom in his provisions for the
progress of society; — and that though in both
cases the designs of Divine Wisdom are often
counteracted by human folly — ^by intemperance
or neglect, as far as relates to the body — and
by mistake or fraud, in respect of the community —
still, in each case, attentive study may enable
us to trace more and more the designs of a wise
Providence, and to devise means for removing
the impediments to their completion.

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My next and some succeeding Lectures will
be occupied with remarks on this view of the
subject.

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LECTURE IV.

*' Bees," said Clcero, '* do not congregate fori
the purpose of constructing a honey-comb ; but
being by nature gregarious animals, combine
their labours in making the comb. And man,
even still more," he continues, '* is formed by
nature for society, and subsequently, as a mem-
ber of society, promotes the common good in
conjunction with his fellow creatures." 4>u(r«
tsroxmxov avflgowro^, is the doctrine maintained by
Aristotle also. Both these writers stood opposed
to some, of their own times, who represented
the social union as an expedient which men
resorted to on account of their mutual wants,
and which they would never have cared for, if
those wants could have been independently sup-
plied. The two writers whom I have alluded to
resembled each other very little in their intellectual
character; but they were both of them far enough »

h2

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■ from overlooking or depreciating the advantages
of the social union ; which yet they agreed in
representing as not formed by men with a view
to those advantages, but from an instinctive
propensity : the one insisting, that if a philo-
sopher coTild be furnished with a magic wand
which woTild command all the necessaries and
luxuries of life, he would still crave companions ;
the other, that without society, though a man
should possess all other goods, life would be not
worth having*; and that to be independent of
associates, one must be either more or less than

man : ^ ieo$ Io-tIv, tj ifig.

Yet the opinion to which they were opposed,
has, in part, always found some advocates, even
' down to the present day.

When I say, ** in part," I mean, that though
there are perhaps few or none who deny man
to be by nature a social Being, incapable, except
in a community, of exercising or developing his
most important and most characteristic faculties,
yet various parts of man's conduct as a member
of society are often attributed to human fore-

P'th. Nicom. book viii.

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thought and design, which might with greater
truth be referred to a kind of instinct, or some-
thing analogous to it ; which leads him, while
pursuing some immediate personal gratification,
to further an object not contemplated by him.
In many cases we are liable to mistake for the
wisdom of Man what is in truth the wisdom of
God.

In nothing, perhaps, will an attentive and can-
did inquirer perceive more of this divine wisdom
than in the provisions made for the progress of
society. But in nothing is it more liable to be
overlooked. In the bodily structure of Man we
plainly perceive innumerable marks of wise con-
trivance, in which it is plain that Man himself
can have had no share. And again, in the results
of instinct in brutes, although the animals them-
selves are, in some sort, agents, we are sure that
they not only could not originally have designed
the effects they produce, but even afterwards
have no notion of the contrivance by which these
were brought about. But when human conduct
tends to some desirable end, and we are compe-
tent to perceive that the end is desirable, and the
means well adapted to it, we are apt to forget,

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that in the great majority of instances, those
means were not devised, nor those ends proposed,
by the persons who were the actual agents.
Those who build and who navigate a ship, have
usually, I conceive, no more thought about the
national wealth and power, the natural refine-
ments and comforts, dependent on the interchange
of commodities, and the other results of com-
merce, than they have of the purification of the
blood in the lungs by the act of respiration, or
than the bee has of the process of constructing a
honeycomb.

Most useful indeed to Society, and much to be
honoured, are those who possess the rare moral
and intellectual endowment of an enlightened
public-spirit ; but if none did service to the
Public except in proportion as they possessed
this. Society I fear would fare but ill. Public-
spirit, either in the form of Patriotism which
looks to the good of a community, or in that of
Philanthropy which seeks the good of the whole
human race, imphes, not merely benevolent feelings
stronger than, in fact, we commonly meet with,
but also powers of abstraction beyond what the
mass of mankind can possess. As it is, many of

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the most important objects are accomplished by
the joint agency of persons who never think of
them, nor have any idea of acting in concert ;
and that, with a certainty, completeness, and
regularity, which probably the most diligent be-
nevolence under the guidance of the greatest
human wisdom could never have attained.

For instance, let any one propose to himself the
problem of supplying with daily provisions of all
kinds such a city as our metropolis, containing
above a million of inhabitants. Let him imagine
himself a head-commissary, entrusted with the
office of furnishing to this enormous host their daily
rations. Any considerable failure in the supply
even for a single day, might produce the most
frightful distress ; since the spot on which they
are cantoned produces absolutely nothing. Some
indeed of the articles consumed admit of being
reserved in public or private stores, for a con-
siderable time ; but many, including most articles
of animal food, and many of vegetable, are of the
most perishable nature. As a deficient supply
of these even for a few days, would occasion
great inconvenience, so, a redundancy of them
would produce a corresponding waste. Moreover,
in a district of such vast extent, as this (as it

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has been aptly called) ** province covered with
houses/' it is essential that the supplies should
be so distributed among the different quarters, as
to be brought almost to the doors of the in-
habitants ; at least within such a distance, that
they may, without an inconvenient waste of time
and labour, procure their daily shares.

Moreover, whereas the supply of provisions for
an army or garrison is comparatively uniform in
kind: here, the greatest possible variety is re-
quired, suitable to the wants of various classes of
consumers.

Again, this immense population is extremely
fluctuating in numbers ; and the increase or
diminution depends on causes, of which, though
some may, others can not, be distinctly foreseen.
The difference of several weeks in the arrival, for
instance, of one of the great commercial fleets,
or in the assembly or dissolution of a parliament,
which cause a great variation in the population,
it is often impossible to foresee.

Lastly, and above all, the daily supplies of each
article must be so nicely adjusted to the stock from
which it is drawn — ^to the scanty, or more or less
abundant, harvest — importation — or other source
of supply — to the interval which is to elapse before

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a fresh stock can be furnished, and to the pro-
bable abundance of the new supply, that as little
distress as possible may be undergone ; — ^that on
the one hand the population may not unneces-
sarily be put upon short allowance of any article,
and that on the other hand they may be pre-
served from the more dreadful risk of famine,
which would ensue from their continuing a free
consumption when the store was insufficient to
hold out.

Now let any one consider this problem in all its
bearings, reflecting on the enormous and fluctu-
ating number of persons to be fed — the immense
quantity, and the variety, of the provisions to be
furnished, the importance of a convenient dis-
tribution of them, and the necessity of husband-
ing them discreetly ; and then let him reflect on
the anxious toil which such a task would impose
on a board of the most experienced and intelli-
gent commissaries ; who after all would be able
to discharge their office but very inadequately.

Yet this object is accomplished far better than
it could be by any effort of human wisdom,
through the agency of men, who think each of
nothing beyond his own immediate interest, —

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who, with that object in view, perform their re-
spective parts with cheerM zeal, — and combine
unconsciously to employ the wisest means for
effecting an object, the vastness of which it
would bewilder them even to contemplate.

Early and long familiarity is apt to generate a
careless, I might almost say, a stupid, indifier-
ence, to many objects, which, if new to us, would
excite a great and a just admiration ; and many
are incUned even to hold cheap a stranger, who
expresses wonder at what seems to us very
natural and simple, merely because we have been
used to it; while in fact perhaps our apathy is
a more just subject of contempt than his asto-
nishment. Moyhanger, ^ New-Zealander who
was brought to England, was struck with especial
wonder, in his visit to London, at the mystery,
as it appeared to him, how such an immense
population could be fed, as he saw neither cattle
nor crops. Many of the Londoners, who would
perhaps have laughed at the savage's admiration,
would probably have been found never to have
even thought of the mechanism which is here at
work.

It id really wonderful to consider with what

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ease and] regularity this importaDt ead is accom-
plished, day after day, and year after year,
through the sagacity and vigilance of private
interest operating on the numerous class, of
wholesale, and more especially retail, dealers.
E^ch of these watches attentively the demands
of his neighbourhood, or of the market he fre-
quents, for such commodities as he deals in.
The apprehension, on the one hand, of not
realizing all the profit he might, and, on the
other hand, of having his goods left on his hands,
either by his laying in too large a stock, or by
his rivals' underselUng him, these, acting like
antagonist muscles, regulate the extent of his
dealings, and the prices at which he buys and
sells. An abundant supply causes him to lower
his prices, and thus enables the public to enjoy
that abundance ; while he is guided only by the
apprehension of being undersold; and, on the
other hand, an actual or apprehended scarcity
causes him to demand a higher price, or to keep
back his goods in expectation of a rise.

For doing this, corn-dealers in particular are
often exposed to odium, as if they were the cause
of the scarcity; while in reality they are per-

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forming the important service of husbanding the
supply in proportion to its deficiency, and thus
warding off the calamity of famine ; in the same
manner as the commander of a garrison or a
ship, regulates the allowances according to the
stock and the time it is to last. But the dealers
deserve neither censure for the scarcity which
they are ignorantly supposed to produce, nor
credit for the important public service which
they in reality perform. They are merely occu-
pied in gaining a fair livelihood. And in the
pursuit of this object, without any comprehensive
wisdom, or any need of it, they cooperate, un-
knowingly, in conducting a system which, we
may safely say, no human wisdom directed to
that end could have conducted so well : — the
system by which this enormous population is fed
from day to day.

I have said, "no human wisdom;" for
wisdom there surely is, in this adaptation of
the means to the result actually produced. In
this instance, as well as in a multitude of
others, from which I selected it for illustration's
sake, there are the same marks of contrivance
and design, with a view to a beneficial end, as

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we are accustomed to admire (when our attention
is drawn to them by the study of Natural-Theo-
logy) in the anatomical structure of the body,
and in the instincts of the brute-creation. The
pulsations of the heart, the ramifications of
vessels in the lungs — the direction of the ar-
teries and of the veins — the valves which pre-
vent the retrograde motion of the blood — all
these, exhibit a wonderful combination of me-
chanical means towards the end manifestly de-
signed, the circulating system. But I know not
whether it does not even still more excite our
admiration of the beneficent wisdom of Pro-
vidence, to contemplate, not corporeal particles,
but rational free agents, cooperating in systems
no less manifestly indicating design, yet no de-
sign of theirs; and though acted on, not by
gravitation and impulse, like inert matter, but
by motives addressed to the will, yet advancing
as regularly and as effectually the accomplish-
ment of an object they never contemplated, as
if they were merely the passive wheels of a ma-
chine. If one may without presumption speak
of a more or a less in reference to the works of
infinite Wisdom, I would say, that the branch of

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Natural Theology with which we are now con-
cerned, presents to the reflective mind views
even more striking than any other. The
heavens do indeed *' declare the glory of God;"
and the human body is ** fearfully and wonder-
fully made ;" but Man, considered not merely
as an organized Being, but as a rational
agent, and as a member of society, is perhaps
the most wonderfully contrived, and to us the
most interesting, specimen of divine Wisdom
that we have any knowledge of. TIoxxjoL ret, Seivo,

The phenomena which can be exhibited directly
to the senses, afibrd perhaps, for the youthful mind,
the best introduction to the study of natural
theology; but even greater admiration will arise as
the philosophical inquirer proceeds to trace the
m^ks of divine Wisdom in the various contrivances
for the well-being of man, exhibited in the com-
plicated structure of society. The investigation
is indeed one of more intricacy and difficulty,
from various causes ; especially, from the more
frequent frustration of the apparent designs of
Providence through human faults and follies ; in
the same manner as, in a less degree, the pro-

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visions of Nature for the growth, and strength,
and health, of the body are often defeated by
man's intemperance or imprudence. But still
I am inclined to think, that if the time should ever
arrive, when the structure of Human Society and
all the phenomena connected with it, shall be as
well understood as Astronomy and Physiology,
it will be regarded as exhibiting even more strik-
ing marks of divine Wisdom.

I shall probably take occasion from time to
time to advert incidentally to this view of the
subject, as the matter which may happen to be
before us may suggest. But the point to which
I wish at present more particularly to call your
attention is, the one in which man, and more
especially man considered as a social Being,
stands contrasted both with inanimate bodies,
and with the lower animals ; — 1 mean, the pro-
visions made for the progress of society. A
capacity of improvement seems to be characteristio
of the Human Species, both as individuals, and
as existing m a community. The mechanical
and chemical laws of matter are not only un*
varying, but seem calculated to preserve all
things either in an imvarying state, or in a

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regular rotation of changes, except where human
agency interferes. The instincts of brutes, as
has been often remarked, lead them to no im-
provement. But in man, not only the faculties
are susceptible of much cultivation, (in which
point he does indeed stand far above the brutes,
but which yet is not peculiar to our species,)
but besides this, what may be called the instincts
of man lead to the advancement of society. I
mean, that (as in such cases as those just alluded
to) he is led to further this object when he has
another in view. And this procedure is, as far
as regards the object which the agent did not
contemplate, precisely analogous, at least, to that
of instinct.

The workman, for instance, who is employed
in casting printing types, is usually thinking
only of producing a commodity by the sale of
which he may support himself; mth reference
to this object, he is acting, not from any impulse
that is at all of the character of instinct, but
from a rational and deliberate choice: but he
is also in the very same act, contributing most
powerfully to the diflFusion of knowledge ; about
which perhaps he has no anxiety or thought :

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in reference to this latter object therefore his
procedure corresponds to those operations of
various animals which we attribute to instinct ;
since they doubtless derive some immediate gra-
tification from what they are doing. So Man is,
in the same act, doing one thing, by choice, for*
his own benefit, and another, undesignedly, under
the guidance of Providence, for the service of the
community.

The branch of Natural Theology to which I
have now been alluding — the contemplation of
the divine Wisdom as displayed in provisions for
the existence, the well-being, and the progress, of
society, comprises a great number of distinct
heads, several of them only partially and incident-
ally connected with the subject of these Lectures.
Our proper business at present is to consider the
subject so far only as it is connected with natural
wealth ; and more immediately the connection of
that, with the advancement of civilization.

And here I must take occasion to remark,
that I do not profess to explain why things were
so ordered, that any advancement at all shoiild
be needful; — why mankind were not placed at
once in a state of society as highly civilized as

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it was destined ever to be *. The reasons for'
this are probably unfathomable by us in this
world. It is suflScient for our present purpose
merely to remark the fact, that the apparent
design of Providence evidently is, the advance-
ment of mankind, not only as Individuals, but as
Communities. Nor again do I profess to explain,
why in so many particular instances causes have
been permitted to operate, more or less, towards
the frustration of this general design, and the
retardation, or even reversal, of the course of
improvement. The difficulty in fact is one which
belongs, not to this alone, but to every branch of
Natural-Theology. In every part of the universe
we see marks of wise and benevolent design ; and
yet we see in many instances apparent frustra-
tions of this design ; we see the productiveness
of the earth interrupted by unfavourable seasons —

' The present Bishop of Chester has treated at large of the
subjects here considered, in the third part of his '* Records of
the Creation;" to which I have much pleasure in referring the
reader, though I do not entirely coincide with every thing that
the author has there said.

In the Notes and Appendix to Archbishop King's Discourse
I have stated my own view of some of the most important of
the questions now alluded to.

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the ^ructure of the animal frame enfeebled, and
its functions impaired, by disease—- and vast
multitudes of living Beings, exposed, from various
causes, to suffering, and to premature destruction.
In the moral and political woiid, wars, and civil
dissention — ^tyrannical governments, unwise laws,
and all evils of this class, correspond to the
inundations — the droughts — ^the tornados, and
the earthquakes, of the natural world. We cannot
give a satisfactory account of either ;— we cannot,
in short, explain the great difficulty, which, in
proportion as we reflect iittentively, we shall more
and more perceive to be the only difficulty in
theology, the existence of evil in the Universe.

But two things we can accomplish ; which are
very important, and which are probably all that
our present faculties and extent of knowledge can
attain to; one is, to perceive clearly that the
difficulty in question is of no unequal pressure^
l)ut bears equally heavy on Deism and on Chris-
tianity, and on various different interpretations of
the Christian scheme; and consequently can
furnish no valid objection to any one scheme of
religion in particular. Another point which is
attainable is, to perceive, amidst all the admixture;

I 2

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of evil, and all the seeming disorder of conflicting
agencies, a general tendency nevertheless towards
the accomplishment of wise and beneficent de-
signs.

As in contemplating an ebbing tide, we are
sometimes in doubt, on a short inspection, whether
fhe sea is really receding, because from time to
time a wave will dash further up the shore than
those which had preceded it, but, if we continue
our observation long enough, we see plainly, that
the boundary of the land is on the whole ad-
vancing; so here, by extending our view over
many countries and through several ages, we
may distinctly perceive the tendencies which
woulcl have escaped a more confined research.

In respect of the point now most particularly
before us, the provisions made for the advance-
tnent of society, so far as they are connected with
the progress of national wealth, I shall proceed to
offer a few remarks, after premising some ob-
servations as to the state of society /rom which it
is, I conceive, that improvement must date its
* commencement. That this is not (as several
writers on Political-Economy have appeared to
suppose) what is properly called the savage state —

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that we have no reason to believe that any com-
munity ever did, or ever can, emerge, unassisted
by external helps, from a state of utter barbarism,
into any thing that can be called civilization — is a
point which I think can be very satisfactorily
established. And I shall afterwards direct your
attention to some of the principal steps by which
nations have advanced, and may be expected to
advance, from a comparatively barbarous, to a
more civilized, condition. And I shall enter on
these subjects in the next and following Lec-
tures.

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LECTURE V.

It was observed in the last Lecture, that civil-
ized Man has not emerged from the savage state;
— that the progress of any community in civil-
ization, by its own internal means, must always
have begun from a condition removed from that
of complete barbarism ; out of which it does not
appear that men ever did or can raise them-
selves.

This assertion is at variance with the hypo-
thesis apparently laid down by several writers
on Political-Economy; who have described the
case of a supposed race of savages, subsisting on
the spontaneous productions of the earth, and
the precarious supplies of hunting and fishing ;
and have then traced the steps by which the
various arts of life would gradually have arisen,
and advanced more and more towards perfection.
One man, it is supposed, having acquired more

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skill than his neighbours in the making of bows
and arrows, or darts^ would find it advantageous
both for them and for himself, to devote himself
to this manufacture, and to exchange these im-
plements for the food procured by others, instead
of employing himself in the pursuit of game.

Another, from a similar cause, would occupy
himself exclusively in the construction of huts,
or of canoes; another, in the preparing of
skins for clothing, &c. and the division of labour
having thus begun, the advantages of it would
be so apparent, that it would rapidly be extended,
and would occasion each person to introduce
improvements into the art to which he would
have chiefly confined his attention. Those who
had studied the haunts and the habits of certain
kinds of wild animals, and had made a trade of
supplying the community with them, would be
led to domesticate such species as were adapted
for it, in order to secm-e a supply of provisions,
when the chase might prove insufficient. Those
who had especially studied the places of growth,
and times of ripening, of such wild fruits, or
other vegetable productions, as were in request,
would be induced to secure themselves a readier

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supply, by cultivating them in suitable spots.
And thus the Society being divided into Hus-
bandmen, Shepherds, and Artificers of various
kinds, exchanging the produce of their various
labours, would advance, with more or less steadi-
ness and rapidity, towards the higher stages of
civilization.

I have spoken of this description as being
conformable to the views apparently entertained
by some writers, and I have said, '* apparently,'*
because I doubt whether it is fair to conclude,
that all, or any of them, have designed to main-
tain that this, or something similar, is a correct
account of a matter of fact ; — -that mankind
universally, or some portions of them, have ac-
tually emerged, by such a process, from a state
of complete barbarism. Some may have be-
lieved this ; but others may have meant merely
that it is possible^ without contending that it
has ever in fact occurred ; and others again may
have not even gone so far as this, but may have
intended merely to describe the steps by which
such a change must take place, supposing it ever
could occur.

Be this as it may, when we dismiss for a

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moment all antecedent conjectures, and look
around us for instances, we find, I think I may
confidently affirm, no one recorded, of a tribe of
savages, properly so styled, rising into a civil-
ized state, without instruction and assistance
from people already civilized. And we havt, on
the other hand, accounts of various savage tribes,
in different parts of the globe, who have been
visited from time to time at considerable in-
tervals, but have had no settled intercourse with
civilized people, and who appear to continue, as
far as can be ascertained, in the same unculti-
vated condition.

It will probably have occurred to most of you,
that the earliest historical records that exist,
represent mankind as originally existing in a
state far superior to that of our supposed savages.
The Book of Genesis describes Man as not hav-
ing been, like the brutes, created, and then leiFt
to provide for himself by his innate bodily and
mental faculties, but as having received, in the
first instance, immediate divine instructions and
communications : and so early, according to this
account, was the division of labour, that of the
first two men who were born of woman, the

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one was a keeper of cattle, and the other a tiller
of the ground.

If this account be received, it must be adr
mitted, that all savages must originally have de-
generated from a more civilized state of existence.
But I am particularly anxious to point out, that,
in a question of this kind, I think it best that
the Scriptures should not be appealed to, in the
first instance, as a work of inspiration, but (if at
all) simply as an historical record of acknow-
ledged antiquity: and in the present instance
I am the more desirous of observing this caution,
because I think that the inquiry now before us,
if conducted with a reference to no authority but
those of reason and experience, will lead to a
result which furnishes a very powerful confirm-
ation of the truth of our religion : and it is plain
that this evidence would be destroyed by an appeal
to the authority of Scripture in the outset, which
would of course be a petitio principii.

It should be observed, moreover, that the hy-
pothesis above alluded to is not necessarily at
variance with the historical records of the creation
and earliest condition of mankind. These do
indeed declare, that mankind did not begin to

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exist in the savage state; but it would not thence
follow, that a nation which had subsequently
sunk into that state, might not raise itself again
out of this barbarism.

Such, however, does not appear to be the fact.
On looking around us and examining all history,
ancient and modern, we find, as I have said, that
no savage tribe appears to have risen into civil-
ization, except through the aid of others who
were civilized. We have, I think, in this case all
the historical evidence that a negative is suscep-
tible of; viz. we have the knowledge of nmnerous
cases in which such a change has not taken place,
and of none where it has ; while we have every
reason to expect, that, if it fiad occurred, it would
have been recorded.

On this subject I will take the liberty of citing
a passage from a very well- written and instruc-
tive book, the account of the New Zealanders,
in the Library of Entertaining Knowledge ; a
passage, which is the more valuable to our
present purpose, inasmuch as the writer is not
treating of the subject with any view whatever
to the evidences of religion, and is apparently
quite unconscious of the argument which (as I

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shall presently shew) may be deduced from what
he says.

** The especial distinction of the savage, and
that which, more than any other thing, keeps
him a savage, is his ignorance of letters. This
places the community almost in the same situa-
tion with a herd of the lower animal^, in so far
as the accumulation of knowledge, or, in other
words, any kind of movement forward, is con-
cerned ; for it is only by means of the art of
writing, that the knowledge acquired by the ex-
perience of one generation can be properly stored
up, so that none of it shall be lost, for the use of
all that are to follow. Among savages, for want
of this admirable method of preservation, there is
reason to believe the fund of knowledge possessed
by the community instead of growing, generally
diminishes with time. If we except the abso-
lutely necessary arts of life, which are in daily
use and cannot be forgotten, the existing gene-^
ration seldom seems to possess any thing derived
from the past. Hence, the oldest man of the
tribe is always looked up to as the wisest ;
simply because he has Uved the longest ; it being
felt that an individual has scarcely a chance of

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knowing any thing more than his own experience
has taught him. Accordingly the New Zea-
landers, for example, seem to have been in quite
as advanced a state when Tasman discovered the
country in 1642, as they were when Cook visited
it, 127 years after.''

It may be remarked, however, with reference
to this statement, that the absence of written
records is, though a very important, rather a
secondary than a primary obstacle. It is one
branch of that general characteristic of the
savage, improvidence. If you suppose the case
of a savage taught to read and write, but allowed
to remain, in all other respects, the same careless,
thoughtless kind of Being, and afterwards left
to himself, he would most likely forget his ac-
quisition; and would certainly, by neglecting
to teach it to his children, suffer it to be lost
in the next generation. On the other hand,
if you conceive such a case (which certainly is
conceivable, and I am disposed to think it a real
one) as that of a people ignorant of this art, but
acquiring in some degree a thoughtful and pro-
vident character, I have little doubt that their
desire, thence * arising, to record permanently

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their laws, practical maxims, and discoveriesi
would gradually lead them, first to the use of
memorial- verses, and afterwards to some kind
of material symbols, such as picture-writing,
and then hieroglyphics ; which might gradually
be still further improved into writing properly so
called.

There are several circumstances which have
conduced to keep out of sight the important
fact I have been alluding to. The chief of these
probably is, the vagueness with which the term
" Savage" is applied. I do not profess, and indeed
it is evidently not possible, to draw a line by
which we may determine precisely to whom that
title is, and is not, applicable ; since there is a
series of almost insensible gradations between the
highest and the lowest state of human society.
Nor is any such exact boundary line needed for
our present purpose. It is sufficient if we admit,
what is probably very far short of the truth,
that those who are in as low a state as some
tribes with which we are acquainted, are in-
capable of emerging from it, by their own un-
assisted efforts. But many probably are misled
by the language of the Greeks and Romans, who

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called all men barbarians except themselves.
Many, and perhaps all other nations, fell short of
them in civilization: but several nations, even
among the least cultivated of the ancient bar-
barians, were very far removed from what we
should be understood to mean by the savage
state, and which is to be found among many-
tribes at the present day. For instance, the
ancient Grermans were probably as much elevated
above that state, as we are above theirs. A
people who cultivated com, though their agri-
culture was probably in a very rude state — who
not only had numerous herds of cattle, but em-
ployed the labour of brutes, and even made use
of cavalry in their wars, and who also were
accustomed to the working of metals, though
their supply of them, according to Tacitus, was
but scanty — these cannot with propriety be
reckoned savages. Or if they are to be so called,
(for it is not worth while to dispute about a
word,) then I would admit, thalt, in this sense,
men may advance, and in fact have advanced,
by their own unassisted efforts, from the savage
to the civilized state.

Again, we are liable to be misled by loose

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and inaccurate descriptionsof extensive districts in-
habited by distinct tribes of people, differing widely
from each other in their degrees of cultivation.
Some, for instance, are accustomed to speak of the
ancient Britons, in the mass ; without considering,
that in all probability some of these tribes were
nearly as much behind others in civiUzation, as
the Children of the Mist described by Sir W.
Scott in the Legend of Montrose, if compared with
the inhabitants of Edinburgh at the same period.
And thus it is probable that travellers have
represented some nation as in the condition of
mere savages, from having viewed only some
part of it, or perhaps even some different nation,
inhabiting some one district of the country.

When due allowance has been made for these
and other sources of inaccuracy, there will be no
reason I think for believing, that there is any
exception to the positions I have here laid down :
the impossibiUty of men's emerging unaided from
a completely savage state ; and, consequently, the
descent of such as are in that state (supposing
mankind to have sprung from a single pair)
from ancestors less barbarous, and from whom
they have degenerated.

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Records of this descent, and of this degeneracy,
it is, from the nature of the case, not likely we
should possess ; but several indications of the
fact may often be found among savage nations.
Some have even traditions to that effect ; and
almost all possess some one or two arts not
. of a piece with their general rudeness, and which
plainly appear to be remnants of a different state
of things ; being such, that the first invention
of them implies a degree of ingenuity beyond
what the savages who retain those arts now
possess. It is very interesting to look over the
many copious accounts we possess of various
savage tribes, with a view to this point. You
will find, I think, in the course of such an in-
quiry, that each savage tribe having retained
such arts as are most essential to their subsistence
in the particular country in which they are
placed, there is accordingly, generally speaking,
somewhat less of degeneracy in many points, in
the colder climates, because these will not admit
of the same degree of that characteristic of sa-
vages, improvidence. Such negligence in pro-
viding clothing and habitations, and in laying up
stores of provisions, as in warm and fertile

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countries is not incompatible with subsistence
in a very rude state, would, in more inhospitable
regions, destroy the whole race in the course of a
single winter.

As to the causes which have occasioned any
portions of mankind thus to degenerate, we are,
of course, in most instances, left to mere con-
jecture : but there seems little reason to doubt,
that the principal cause has been War. A people
perpetually harassed by predatory hostile in-
cursions, and still more, one compelled to fly
their country and take refuge in mountains or
forests ^ or to wander to some distant un-
occupied region, (and this we know to have
been anciently a common occurrence) must of
course be likely to sink in point of civilization;
they must, amidst a series of painful struggles
for mere existence, have their attention drawn
off from all other subjects ; they must be de-
prived of the materials and the opportunities
for practising many of the arts, till the know-
ledge of them is lost ; and their children must
grow up, in each successive generation, more
and more uninstructed, and disposed to be sa-

' Whence the name ** Savage," Silvagio,

k2

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tisfied with a life approaching to that of the
brutes.

A melancholy picture of the operation of these
causes is presented in the kingdom of Abyssinia ;
which seems to have been for a considerable time
verging more and more from a state of comparative
civilization towards barbarism, through the in-
cessant hostile incursions of its Pagan neighbours,
the Galla. But whatever may have been the
causes which in each instance have tended to barba-
rize each nation, of this we may, I think, be well
assured, that, though if it have not sunk below a
certain point, it may, under favourable circum-
stances, be expected to rise again, and gradually
even more than recover the lost ground ; on the
other hand, there is a stage of degradation from
which it cannot emerge, but through the means
of intercourse with some more civilized people*
The turbulent and unrestrained passions — the in-
dolence — and, above all, the want of forethought,
which are characteristic of savages, naturally
tend to prevent, and, as experience seems to
shew, always have prevented, that process of
gradual advancement from taking place, which
was sketched out in the opening of this Lecture ;

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except when the savage is stimulated by the
example, and supported by the guidance and in-
struction, of men superior to himself.

Now if this be the case, when, and how, did
civilization first begin ? If Man when first created
was left, like the brutes, to the unaided exercise
of his natural powers of body and mind — those
powers which are common to the European and
to the New-Hollander — ^how comes it that the
European is not now in the condition of the
New-Hollander ? As the soil itself and the climate
of New-Holland are excellently adapted to the
growth of corn, and yet (as corn is not indigenous
there) could never have borne any, to the end of
the world, if it had not been brought thither
from another country, and sown; so, the savage
himself, though he may be, as it were, a soil
capable of receiving the seeds of civilization, can
never, in the first instance, produce it, as of
spontaneous growth ; and unless those seeds be
introduced from some other quarter, must remain
for ever in the steriUty of barbarism. And from
what quarter then could this first beginning of
civilization have been supplied, to the earliest
race of mankind? According to the present

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course of nature, the first introducer of cultiva-
tion among savages, is, and must be, Man, in a
more improved state : in the beginning therefore
of the human race, this, since there was no man
to effect it, must have been the work of another
Being. There must have been, in short, a Revela-
tion made to the first, or to some subsequent
generation, of our species. And this miracle (for
such it is, as being an impossibility according to
the present course of nature) is attested, inde-
pendently of the authority of Scripture, and con-
sequently in confirmation of the Scripture-ac-
counts, by the fact, that civilized Man exists at
the present day. Taking this view of the siibject,
we have no need to dwell on the utility — the
importance — the antecedent probability— of a
Revelation : it is established as a fact, of which
a monument is existing before our eyes. Divine
instruction is proved to be necessary, not merely
for an end which we think desirable, or which we
think agreeable to Divine wisdom and goodness,
but, for an end which we Icnow has been attained.
That Man could not have made himself, is ap-
pealed to as a proof of the agency of a divine
Creator : and that Mankind could not in the first

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instance have civilized themselves, is a proof,
exactly of the same kind, and of equal strength,
of the agency of a divine Instructor.

Such is the evidence which an attentive survey
of human transactions will supply, to those who
do not, in their too hasty zeal, begin by appeal-
ing to the authority of Scripture in matters which
we are competent to investigate.

The full development of this branch of evi-
dence, which I have slightly noticed, but which
it would be unsuitable to the character of these
Lectm:es to enlarge on, will be found, I think, to
lead to very interesting and important views.

Mankind then having, as Scripture informs us,
been favoured from the first with an immediate
intercourse with the Creator, and having been
placed in a condition, as keepers of domestic
animals, and cultivators of the earth, more fa-
vourable to the development of the rational
faculties, than, we have every reason to think,
they could ever have reached by the mere exer-
cise of their natural powers; it is probable they
were thenceforth left to themselves in all that
relates to the invention and improvement of the
arts of life. If we judge from the analogy of the

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other parts of revelation, we find it agreeable to
the general designs of Providence, that such
knowledge, and such only, should be imparted to
Man supernaturatty, as he could not otherwise
have attained; and that whatever he is capable
of discovering by the exercise of his natural
faculties, (however important the knowledge of
it may be,) he should be left so to discover for
himself: — in short, that no further miraculous
interference should take place, than is absolutely
indispensable. And if again we judge from ob-
servation, we know that a knowledge of all the
arts of life was not divinely communicated. The
first race of Mankind seem to have been placed
merely in such a state as might enable and incite
them to commence, and continue, a course of
advancement.

And to place Man in such a state, seems in
fact no more than analogous to what was done
for the lower animals in the mere act of creation,
considering how much more completely they
are furnished with instincts than we are. To
have left man (as the brutes are left) in, what
some choose to call, a state of nature, i. e. in the
condition of an adult who should have grown up

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totally without cultivation, would have been to
leave him with his principal faculties not only
undeveloped, but without a chance of ever being
developed ; which is not the case with the brutes.
Such a procedure therefore would in reaUty not
have been analogous to what takes place in re-
spect of the lower animals, but would have been
disproportionately disadvantageous to man. In
fact, there is no good reason for calling the con-
dition of the rudest savages *' a state of nature.*'
On the contrary, such language is as much at
variance with sound philosophy, as the dreams
of those who imagine this state to resemble the
golden age of the poets, are, with well ascertained
facts. The peaceful life and gentle disposition,
the freedom from oppression, the exemption from
selfishness and from evil passions, and the sim-
plicity of character, of savages, have no existence
but in the fictions of poets, and the fancies of
vain speculators: nor can their mode of life be
called, with any propriety, the natural state of
man. A plant would not be said to be in its
natural state, which was growing in a soil or
chmate that precluded it from putting forth the
flowers and the fruit for which its organization

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was destined. No one who saw the pine grow*
ing near the boundary of perpetual snow on the
Alps, stunted to the height of two or three feet,
and struggling to exist amidst rocks and glaciers,
would describe that as the natural state of a tree,
which in a more genial soil and climate, a little
lower down, was found capable of rising to the
height of fifty or sixty yards. In like manner,
the natural state of man must, according to all
fair analogy, be reckoned not that in which his
intellectual and moral growth are as it were
stunted, and permanently repressed, but one in
which his original endowments are, I do not say,
brought to perfection, but enabled to exercise
themselves, and to expand, like the flowers of a
plant ; and, especially, in which that character-
istic of our species, the tendency towards pro-
gressive improvementy is permitted to come into
play.

Such then, I say, seems to have been the state
in which the earliest race of mankind were placed
by the Creator.

What were their earliest inventions and dis-
coveries, and in what order the several arts
originated, we have no means of ascertaining.

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The brief and scanty record of Genesis furnishes
only a slight notice of two ; the working of
metals, and the construction of musical instru-
ments. The knowledge of fire must have been
earlier ; but this was in all probability (agreeably
to the tradition of the Heathen respecting Pro-
metheus) no human discovery, but a gift of Pro-
vidence'^. It does not seem likely, that man
could have discovered (at least till after a very long
series of years) I do not say fire, but the uses of
fire. A volcanic eruption, or a conflagration by
lightning, might have exhibited fire itself; but
the untaught savage would have been more likely
to fly from so tremendous an agent, than to
attempt making it his servant.

A conjectural history of the probable origin of
the various arts which are the most universal
among mankind, would suggest much interest-
ing speculation. It is not of course my design

* The Heathen Mythology contains, among a chaos of
wild fables, broken and scattered fragments, as it were,
lof true history ; like the organic remains of an ancient
world found dispersed, and often hard to be ascertained,
in the midst of the strata formed from the deposits of a
deluge.

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to enter on an inquiry which would be in a great
degree foreign to the subject before us. I will
merely remark, that the more you speculate on
this curious subject, the more you will be struck
with this consideration ; that many of the com-
monest arts, and which appear the simplest, and
require but a very humble degree of intelligence
for their exercise, are yet such, that we must
suppose various accidents to have occurred, and
to have been noted — many observations to have
been made and combined — and many experiments
to have been tried — ^in order to their being ori-
ginally invented. And the difficulty must have
been much greater, before the invention, and the
familiar %ise, of writing, had enabled each gene-
ration to record for the use of the next, not only
its discoveries, but its observations and incom-
plete experiments. It has often occurred to me,
that the longevity of the antediluvians was pro-
bably a special provision to meet this difficulty,
in those early ages which most needed such
a help. Even now that writing is in use, a single
individual, if he Uve long enough to follow up a
train of experiments, has a great advantage in
respect of discoveries, over a succession of indi-

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viduals ; because he will remember, when the
occasion arises, many of his former observations,
and of the ideas that had occurred to his mind,
which, at the time, he had not thought worth
recording. But previous to the use of writing,
the advantage of being able to combine in one's
own person the experience of several centuries,
must have been of immense importance : and it
was an advantage which the circumstances of the
case seemed to require.

On the whole, then, it appears, that as soon,
and only as soon, as Society has taken a certain
step, and is enabled to start, as it were, from
a certain point, viz. from such a condition
nearly, as that in which the first generation
appears to have been actually placed, then, and
thenceforward, the tendency towards advance-
ment comes into operation, so far as it is not
checked by external impediments. The causes
which tend to the gradual increase of wealth in a
ratio even greater than the increase of popu-
lation, and to the growth of all that we call by
the collective name '* Civilization," are thence-
forth at work ; with more or less certainty and
rapidity, according as the obstacles are less or

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more powerful : and no boundary to the effects
of these causes seems assignable.

Some remarks on the principal steps of this
progress will occupy the next Lecture.

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LECTURE VI.

There is, as we have seen, a certain stage of
civilization, though it may be difficult to deter-
mine precisely where it lies, which is necessary
to the commencement of a course of improve-
ment. A community placed in a condition short
of this, and not aided from without, must, as
experience has fully shewn, either remain sta-
tionary, or even sink deeper into barbarism.
And when this point is once passed, the progress
towards a higher state of civilization, will, as far
as it is not prevented by accidental obstacles,
begin, and gradually continue. Society may be
compared to those combustible substances which
will never take fire spontaneously, but when
once ignited will generate heat sufficient not only
to keep up the combustion, but to burn with
still increasing force. A human community re-
quires, as it were, to be kindled, and requires no
more.

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Let a Nation, though still in a rude state,
possess the knowledge of some of the simplest
and most essential arts — a certain degree of
division of labour — and above all a recognition,
and tolerable security, of property ; and it will
not fail, unless very grievously harassed by wars,
inundations, or some such calamities, to increase
its wealth, and to advance more or less in civil-
ization. I have spoken of security of property as
the most essential point, because, though no
progress can be made without a division of labour,
this could neither exist without security of pro-
perty, nor could fail to arise with it. No man,
it is plain, could subsist by devoting himself
either wholly or partially to the production of
one kind of commodity, trusting to the supply of
his other wants by exchanging part of that com-
modity with his neighbours, unless he were
allowed to keep it, and to dispose of it, as his
own. On the other hand, let property be but
established and secured, and the division of
labour, even if it had not previously existed,
would be the infallible result ; because the ad-
vantages of it to each individual, in each par-
ticular instance, would catch the attention of

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every one who possessed but a moderate degree
of forethought.

A. Smith, in treating of the advantages of the
division of labour, has entirely omitted one,
which is, in all respects, one of the most im-
portant, and, in giving rise to the practice, clearly
the most important of all. He dwells chiefly
on the superior skill which a man acquires,
in an occupation to which he has confined him-
self. This is undoubtedly a very great advan-
tage ; but it is evidently such an effect of the
division of labour, as could not be known but by
experience ; and indeed could not exist till some
time had elapsed for the increased expertness
to be acquired : it could not consequently, in
any instance, lead to the division of labour, till
the practice had been generally established, and
the improvement in skill thence resulting become
matter of common observation. But the ad-
vantage I am alluding to (and which is in itself
as important as any) is one which would readily
be anticipated^ and would be obtained immediately ^
previous to any advancement in skill. The
advantage I mean is, that in a great variety
of cases, pearly the same time and labour are

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required to perform the same operation on a
larger or on a smaller scale — ^to prodnce many
things, or one, of the same kind.

The most familiar instance of this, and the
one most frequently adduced, is the carriage of
letters. It makes very little difference of trouble,
and none, of time, to carry one letter, or a whole
parcel of letters, from one town to another ;
and accordingly, though there is no particular
skill requisite in this business, there is perhaps
Do one instance that more strikingly displays
the benefit of the division of labour than Uie
establishment of the Past-office ; but for which,
each person would have to dispatch a special
messenger whenever he wanted to communicate
^ith his friend at a distance.

But the circumstance to which I am now
particularly calling your attention, is, that this
kind of advantage is one which would be imme-
diate, and readily anticipated. In fact, a division
of labour, with a view to it, is almost imme-
diately adopted for the present occasion on any
emergency that arises, even when there is no
peculiar fitness in each person for his own de-
{mrtmeirt, and no thought of making the arr^nge-

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tbent permanent. For instance, suppose a num-
ber of travellers proceeding through some nearly
desert country, such as many parts of America,
and journeying together in a kind of cafila or
caravan for the sake of mutual security : when
they came to a halting-place for the night, they
would not fail to make some kind of extern-
jk>r^neous arrangement, that some should unlade
and fodder the cattle, while others should fetch
flrfe'-wood from the nearest thicket, and others,
water from the spring : some in the mean time
Would be occupied in pitching the tents, or erect-
ing sheds of boughs ; others in preparing food
for the whole party; while some again, with
their arms in readiness, would be posted as
£(entinels in suitable spots, to watch that the rest
might not be surprised by bands of robbers.
It would be evident to them that but for such an
wiiangement, each man would have to go both
to' the spring for water, and to the wood for
fuel — would have to prepare his own meal with
dlnfiost as much trouble as it costs to dress food
for the whole — and would have to p^orm all
these tasks encumbered with his arms, and on
the watch against a hostile attack. Of course,

l2

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if some of our supposed party chanced to be
by nature or by practice peculiarly qualified for
some particular task, and others for another,
these would be respectively allotted to them in
preference ; but if there were no such inequality,
the division would still take place, and the chief
advantage of it would still be felt.

Such a case as this exhibits an instance of
what may be called a temporary Community,
containing a distribution of labourers into several
departments, which have a considerable corre-
spondencewith the different trades and occupations
that are permanently established. One portion
of the members of a community are employed to
protect the rest from violence ; another, to pro-
vide them with food ; another, to construct their
habitations ; and so of the rest.

But in order to the existence of such a state
of things, it is necessary (as I have said) that
property should be recognised, and should be
tolerably well secured. ** It is this main spring,"
(says Bp. Sumner, in the second volume of the
Records of the Creation,) ** which keeps the arts
and civilized industry in motion. ' The first,
who having enclosed a spot of ground, has taken

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upon himself to assert, This is mine, and has
remained undisturbed in the possession of it,
gives a new aspect to the society,' and lays the
foundation, not of crimes, and wars, and murders,
as Rousseau proceeds to say, as if these were
unknown to the savage ; but of improvement and
civilization.

*' Man is easily brought and quickly reconciled
to labour ; but he does not undertake it gra-
tuitously. If he is in possession of immediate
ease, he can only be induced to relinquish that
present advantage by the allurement of expected
gain. Gratification, which in some degree or
other forms the chief excitement of civilized life,
is almost unknown to the savage. The only
stimulus felt by him, is that of necessity. He is
impelled by hunger to hunt for subsistence, and
by cold to provide against the rigour of the
seasons. When his stock of provision is laid in,
his rude clothing prepared, and his cabin con-
structed, he relapses into indolence ; for the wants
of necessity are supplied, and the stimulus which
urged him is removed. However experienced
he may be in the preparation of skins for clothing
or of reeds for building, beyond the wants of his

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own family he has no demand fpr ingenuity^ or
skill ; for the equality of property has confined
each man's possessions to the bare necessaries of
life; and though he were to employ his art ia
providing for his whole tribe, they have nothing
to offer him in exchange. As long as this state
of things continues, it is plain that we can expect
neither improvement of art nor exertion of in-
dustry. Whatever is fabricated, will be fabri-
cated with almost equal rudeness, whilst eaqh
individual supplies his own wants ; and he wilj
continue to supply them, as long as th^ wants of
the society are Umited to the demands of nature.
An intelligent traveller who had an opportunity
of observing this on the spot, remarks exactly to
the point, that ' the Indians of Guiana have no
interest in the accumulation of property, and,
therefore, are not led to labour in orcjer to attain
wealth. Living under the most perfect equality,
they are not impelled to industry by that spirit
of emulation, which in society leads to gre^
^d unwearied toil.'

^' But as soon as it has been agreed,^ by a com-
pact of whatever kind, that the property l|ef<w
belonging to the community at large, shall be

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divided among the individuals who compose it,
and that whatever each of them shall hereafter
obtain, shall be considered as his exclusive pos-
session ; the effect of this division will shew that
industry requires no other stimulus than a re-
ward proportioned to its exertion.

"We have an instance in the natives of the
Pelew Islands, who, deprived as they were of all
external advantages, afford a most decisive con-
trast to the inactivity of the American tribes,
Before their accidental discovery in 1783, they
had enjoyed no intercourse with civilized na-
tions, had no acquaintance with the use of iron,
or the cultivation of corn, or regular manufac-
ture. But they had been fortunate in the esta-
blishment of a division of ranks, ascending from
the servant to the king ; and a division of pro-
perty, rendering not only ' every man's house,
furniture, or canoe, his own, but also the land
allotted to him as long as he occupied and cul-
tivated it.' The effect of this is distinguishable
in habits so different from those hitherto repre-
sented, that * the portion of time each family
could spare from providing for their natural
wants, was passed in the exercise of such little

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arts, as, while they kept them active and indus-
trious, administered to their convenience and
comfort/ Here also were no traces of that
want of curiosity, which all travellers remark
as so extraordinary in America. Industry had
sharpened their minds. ITie natives were con-
stantly interested in obtaining every information
respecting the English tools and workmanship.'^

I need not cite more from a book probably so
well known to most of you ; and will therefore
only observe, that the whole chapter'' is well
worth a re-perusal, with a view to the point now
before us.

When then this distribution of employments
had been established, the benefits resulting from
it would be so obvious, that it would tend to-
wards a continual increase : the benefits, I mean,
to each individual ; who would discover^ without
any extraordinary sagacity, that he could much
more amply supply his own wants, by directing
his whole or his chief attention to one, or to a
few, kinds of employment, and receiving from
his neighbours in return the fruits of their in-
dustry, than by himself providing directly for

•* Chap. iii. part 2.

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all his own wants. As for the benefit to the
community thence resulting, thaty as I remarked
in a former Lecture, is a provision of Divine
Wisdom : it is not necessary, nor is it usually the
case, that each who labours in his own depart-
ment, should be stimulated to do so by public-
spirit, or should even perceive and contemplate
(as in the case of our supposed Uttle party of
travellers) the benefit he is conferring on the
rest.

In proportion then as the division of labour
was extended, exchanges would become more and
more frequent. For, diversity of production is
evidently the foundation of exchange ; since, as
long as each individual provides for all his own
wants, and only for them, he will have nothing to
part with, and nothing to receive. Barter then
having become a customary transaction, would
naturally be superseded, in the progress of so-
ciety, by the employment of some kind of Money.
I do not design to enter at present on the multi-
farious and important inquiries which pertain
to the subject of Money. It will suffice for our
present purpose to state, that by Money, I mean,
any commodity in general request, which is re-

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ceived in exchange for other commodities, not
for the purpose a[ being directly used by the
party receiving it, (for that is Barter,) but for the
purpose of being again parted with in exchange
for something else. It is not the very commodity
which the party wants, or expects hereafter to
want ; but it is a security or pledge {ohv hyyvv^fuz
according to Aristotle) that he may obtain that
commodity whenever he wants it, from those who
have it to spare. The Herdsman who needed, ot
expected hereafter to need, a supply of corn,
might, if he could not otherwise arrange an ex-
change, be willing to part with some of his cattle
for cloth of which he had no need, in the ex-
pectation of being able to exchange that again
for corn, with some one who either needed it, or
would accept it in the same manner as he hsd
done. ITie cloth would serve the purpose of
money, till it should reach the hands of one who
designed to keep it for his own use. And there
are some parts of Africa it appears, where pieces
of cloth of a certain definite size and quaUty con-
stitute the current coin, if I may so speak, of the
country. In other parts again of Africa, wedg«
of salt are said to be applied to the same purpose.

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But the herdsman would probably prefer re-
ceiving in this manner, instead of any articles
cf food or clothing ^hich he did not him-
self need, some Qmamental article in general re-
quest, such as a bracelet or necklace, of gold^
^ver, or valued shells or stones ; not only as less
bulky and less perishable, but because these could
be wed by him in the only way they can be used,
viz, for the purpose of display, till he should have
occasion to part with them ; and could then be
parted with without any inconvenience. Ac-
cordingly the prevaiUng tendency has always been
to adopt as a medium of exchange, in preference
to all others, articles of an ornamental character,
iwized for their beauty and rarity ; such as the
silver and gold which have long been much the
most extensively used for this purpose — the
cowry-shdls, admired for making necklaces, and
very generally used as money throughout an ex-
tensive region in Africa — ^the porcellane shells
employed in like manner in some parts of the
East Indies, and the wampum of some of the
native American Indians, which consists of a kind
of bugles wrought out of shells, and used both as
an ornament and as money. Articles of this

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kind, as traffic increased, would come to be
collected and stored up in much greater quantities
than their original destination for purposes of
ornament could have called for ; but it is from that,
no doubt, that they must originally have been in
demand; since it is inconceivable that all the
members of any one community, much less,
various nations, should in the first instance have
made a formal agreement arbitrarily to attach a
value to something which had not been before at
all regarded by them. It is said, that at this day
among some half-civiUzed nations, the women
adorn themselves with strings of gold coins.
But silver plate, and gold or gilt ornaments, are I
believe in use, and that, to a very large amount,
among all nations who employ those metals as
money. Some years ago I remember hearing an
estimate of the gold consumed in gilding alone,
in the one town of Birmingham, as amounting to
one thousand pounds weight, or about £50,000
worth.

When then property was secured, and ex-
changes facilitated, by the intervention of money,
the use of this medium would re-act on the divi-
sion of labour, and extend it ; because then any

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one who could produce any commodity in general
request, would be sure of employing himself
beneficially in producing it, even though the par-
ticular persons who wanted that commodity, could
not supply him in return with the precise article^
he had need of. They would now be able to
purchase it of him for that in exchange for which
lie might procure from others what he wanted.

As wealth increased, the continued stimulus
of emulation would make each man strive to sur-
pass, or at least not fall below, his neighbours, in
this. I say ** the continued stimulus of emula-
tion," because it is important to keep in mind,
that the selfishness — the envy — the injustice
and baseness of every kind, which we so often
see called forth in the competitions of worldly-
minded men, are not to be attributed to the
increase of national wealth. Among poor and
barbarous nations, (as I formerly remarked,) we
may find as much avarice, fraud, vanity, and
envy, called forth, in reference perhaps to a
string of beads, a hatchet, or a musket, as are
to be found in wealthier communities.

The desire of wealth (which has no name, ex-
cept those denoting its vicious excess, Avarice

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or Gkivetousness,) and emulatioti, or the desire of
equalizing or surpassing others, are, neither of
them, in themselves, either virtuous or vicious.
A desire of gain, which is either excessive, or has
only selfish gratification in view, is base and odious :
when the object is to keep one's family from want
and dependence, it is commendable ; when wealth
is sought as a means of doing extensive good,
the pursuit is noble. Emulation, again, when it
d^enerates into envy, is detestable ; — ^when di-
rected to trifling objects, contemptible; — when
duly controlled, and directed to the best objects,
though it does not of itself furnish the noblest
and purest motive, it is a useful and honourable
ally of virtue. And, in both cases, there are,
between the highest and the basest motives,
almost infinite gradations and intermixtures.
But the point to which I wish to call your atten-
tion, as most pertinent to the present inquiry, is^
that by the wise and benevolent arrangemetit
of Providence, even those who are thinking only
of their own credit and advantage, are, in the
pursuit of these selfish objects, led, unconsciously,
to benefit others : the public welfare is not left
to depend merely on the operation of public-

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spirit. The husbandman and the weaver exert
their utmost industry and ingenuity, to increase
the produce of the earth and of the loom ; each,
that he may be enabled to command for him-
self a better share of other productions; but
in so doing, they cause the community to be
better fed, and better clothed. The efforts of
each man, with a view to his own credit, to rise,
or at least not to sink, in society, causes, when it
becomes general^ the whole Society to rise in wealth.
And the progress thus occasioned by emulation,
is indefinite ; because the object aimed at by each
of a great number, viz. superiority to the rest,
can never be attained by all of them. If men's
desires were limited to a supply of the necessaries
and commonest comforts of life, their efforts to
attain this would indeed bring the society up to a
certain point, but would not necessarily tend to
advance it any further ; because it is conceivable
that this object might be attained by all; and if
it were, the society might thenceforward con-
tinue stationary ; but when a great proportion of
its members are striving, each, to attain, not
merely an absolute, but a comparative, degree of
wealth, there must always be many, who, though

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they do advance, will yet remain in the same
position relative to their neighbours, who are
equally advancing ; and thus the same stimulus
w^U continue to operate from generation to gene-
ration. The race never comes to an end, while
the competitors are striving, not to reach a certain
fixed goal, but, each, either permanently to keep
a-head of the rest, or at least, not to be among
the hindmost '.

All this, it may be said, is but a melancholy
though true description, of the mean and silly
ambition of mankind.

It would be more suitable to an Ethical trea-
tise, than to these Lectures, to discuss the ques-
tion as to the degrees of attention to worldly
objects which may be allowable, or, more or less,

" Hence Mandeville calls ** Content, the bane of industry ;"
playing on the double meaning of the word '* content." He
who has attained the power of commanding with ease a
supply of all that he wishes for, and is content, in the sense
of desiring nothing further, is not likely to be industrious.
But one who is exerting himself all his life in the pursuit of
fresh and fresh advancement, whether in Wealth, Learning,
Fame, Virtue, or any other object, is not necessarily discon^
tented and unhappy. On the contrary, a pursuit seems a
main ingredient in happiness.

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foolish, or sinful. Nor is a decision of these
questions at all necessary with a view to the
particular pmnt now more immediately before us.
For that, it is sufficient if we keep in mind,
what has been already observed, that a devoted-
ness to temporal objects is no characteristic of a
more wealthy and civilized, as distinguished from
a more barbarous, state of society. Emulation,
though directed to different objects, is found
among savages, except when they are indulging
in a]j^hetic indolence or gross sensuality. But
there is this important difference ; that in civil-
ized life it is frequently directed (however seldom
in comparison of what it should be) to many
nobler objects, of which the savage can not even
form any conception ; and again, that even when
merely selfish, it tends (without design on the
part of the individual) to produce many bene-
ficial results to the Society, which it does not
produce^ or in a far less degree, among savages.

Tlie same may be said of the desire of gain.
The savage is commonly found to be covetous,
frequently rapacious, when his present inclination
impels him to seek any object which he needs,
or which his fancy is set on. He is not indeed

M

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do steady or so provident, in his pursuit of gain, as
the civilized man ; but this is from the generai
unsteadiness and improvidence of his character ;
not from his being engrossed by higher pursuits.
What keeps him poor, in addition to want of
skill and insecurity of property, is, not a philoso-
phical contempt of riches, but a love of sluggish
torpor and of present gratification. The same
may be said of such persons as constitute the
dregs of a civiKzed community ; they are idle,
thoughtless, improvident ; but thievish. Melan-
choly as it is to see, as we may, for instance, ia
our own country, multitudes of Beings of such
high qualifications and such high destination as
Man, absorbed in the pursuit of merely external
and merely temporal objects — occupied in schemes
for attaining wealth and worldly aggrandisement,
without any higher views in pursuing them, we
must remember that the savage is not above such
a life, but below it. It is not from preferring
virtue to wealth — ^the goods of the mind to those
of fortune — the next world to the present — that
he takes so little thought for the morrow; but,
from want of forethought and of habitual self-
command. The civilized man, too often,^ directs

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these qualities to an unworthy object; the savage,
universally, is deficient in the qualities them-
selves. The one is a stream flowing, too often,
in a wrong channel, and which needs to have its
course altered ; the other is a stagnant pool.

But I am so far from attributing to Man, as a
merit, the benefits which, in an advanced stage
of society, he confers on the community, that,
on the contrary, the very point I am especially
dwelling on is, the bountiful wisdom of Pro-
vidence, in directing towards the public good
the conduct of those, who, even when not basely
selfish, are yet not impelled to the course they
pursue by patriotic motives.

A man, for instance, who has accumulated
wealth, as in the progress of Society naturally
takes place, more and more, may be so selfishly
disposed, that he would willingly consume his
whole revenue himself, without a thought of
benefiting others. But though there are various
modes of expenditure, some more and some less
beneficial to the public, in which he may employ
it, it is hardly possible for him to keep it entirely
to himself. Directly or indirectly he will always
be feeding labourers with it. He may employ

M 2

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them in producing something which will J^dd to
the stock of national wealth ; in which case he
will be enriching the commtmity ; but if he
employ them in making lace, or diving for
pearls, to add to the splendour of his dress, or
in pulling dowu his house, and rebuilding it
after some fancy of his own, or in waiting at his
table, stilt he maintains them. And though it
IS a mistake (a very common one, by the way,
and which hereafter it will be necessary to treat
of) to suppose, that, in all this, he is a benefactor
to the community, by furnishing employment,
stiU he is at least no more consuming his re-
venue himself, than if he had thought fit to give
it away to the same number of persons; — to
bestow on those, who are now employed in la-
bouring for him, the bread they eat, leaving them
to sit idle. The only difference is, that they are
at work instead of doing nothing, and that they
feel that they earn thdr own bread, instead of
being fed by charity. It is only when a rich
man lays down in forest, Kke WiUiam the Con-
queror, a quantity of fertile land, or in some
such way diminishes human subsistence, that his
wealth is detrimental to the community.

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And this is one of the points connected with
our present subject, which is at once so simple,
as to be easily etplained to the labouring classes,
and of high importance for them to understand.
For at the first glance, they are apt to imagine,
when they see ai rich man whose income is a
hilndrid times as much as suffices to maintain a
poor man's family, that if he were stripped of all,
and his Wealth divided, a hilndred poor families
additional might thus obtain subsistence ; which,
it is plain, wduld not be the case, eveni when the
income was spent in feiith ostentatious and selfish
vanity, as I have been alluding to.

But, in fact, a vdry large portion of the wealth
that exists in a country, is employed in procur-
ing a further increase of Wealth ; in other wordsv
is employed as CapitaiL

It would be preniatture to enter at present on
a discussion of the nature of Capital, and the
various questions cdnnected With it. But it is
sufficiently evident for our present purpose, that
wealth is employed, and is a most important
agent, for the production of wealth: so important
indeed, that the first beginnings of it must hate
been attained with extreme difficulty, since labour

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is comparatively inefficient without it. Com is
raised by labour ; but com is needed both to sow
the land, and to support the labourer till the
harvest is ripe: the tools with which he works
are produced by other tools : the handle of the
axe with which he fells the wood, came from the
wood ; and the iron of it was dug from the mine
with iron implements. We hardly know how to
estimate the impediments to the few first steps>
when stakes and sharp stones were the tools, and
the labourer's subsistence consisted in the spon-
taneous products of the earth, and the flesh of
wild animals. But it is plain, that each succeed-
ing step must have been easier, and at the same
time more effective; till at length the various
contrivances for abridging labour, that is, render-
ing labour incomparably more productive, at
length enabled a large portion of the community
to live exempt from all share in the labour of
producing the necessaries of life ; while yet the
whole population, though immensely increased
in numbers, were better fed, clothed, and lodged,
than any had been, in that earlier stage, when
every one without exception was compelled to
labour for his daily food.

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And it is remarkable, that the tendency which
the conduct of individuals in pursuing their own
private ends, even when these ends are purely
selfish, has, towards promoting the interest of
the community, is more and more developed, as
society advances. Take, for example, the case
of a miser ; one whose selfishness takes the turn
of a love of hoarding : such a person, though his
individual character is of course every where the
same, is yet, in respect of the effects of his
conduct on others, very different in different
stages of society. You will perceive, on a little
reflection, that in a community where commercial
transactions are yet in a rude state, the conduct
of a miser is detrimental to the public ; while in
one that is in a more advanced stage, he is rather
benefiting others by the sacrifice of his own com-
forts.

In former times, the Miser withdrew from iLse
such articles as constituted the wealth of the
community ; such as com, clothing, implements
and furniture of various kinds, and above all,
as the least perishable and least bulky, gold and
silver and jewels. All these things, even if not
kept till spoilt, or hidden so as to be permanently

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168

lost, were at least withdrawn during his life-time
from the enjoyment of the community; which
would supply the deficiency either directly by
the labour of its own members, or by exchang-
ing with other nations the produce of that la-
bour ^

Some few instances occur, even in such a state
of society as ours, of this kind of hoarding ;
but they are very rare, and generally on a very

^ This, b^ the wa^, suggests a tore method of obtaining,
what was so long sought by legislators, a general ** favourable
balance of trade" in the country. If a quantity of gold and
silver be annually buriedy a constant importation will ensue,
of these metals, in exchange for other commodities, to supply
the demand for bullion thus created.

Such is supposed to have been the condition, till within
these few years, of the Peninsula of India ; which was con-
stantly receiving and absorbing a vast amount of silver ; the
insecurity of property (till lately) leading to the practice of this
kind of hoarding.

In this way, or again, by an immense annual consumption
of gold and silver in gilding and plating, (and in no other
way,) it is possible for a country to maintain a permanently
** favourable balance of trade" with all the world: i. e. to im-
port every year, on the whole, a less amount of other . articles
than it exports, receiving the difference in gold and silver.
See ** Senior on the Transmission of the precious metals."

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small scale, being chiefly found among the lowest
orders.

On the other hand, in countries as far ad-
vanced in commercial transactions as almost the
whole of Europe is, it may be said that, with
hardly any exceptions, hoarding withdraws no-
thing from the public use. If the miser is en-
gaged in any kind of business, he lives himself
indeed (as in the other case) on a miserable
pittance; but his desire of gain naturally prompts
him to add continually his profits to his capital ;
which is a part of the capital of the country, viz.
of the stock that is employed profitably, in
producing more commodities ; which are used
by others, though the owner will not indulge
himself with them. If he is not himself engaged
in business, it comes to the same thing; for
in that case he lends to others, for the sake of
increasing his store ; and continues to invest in
like manner the interest they pay him. And
it makes no difference whether he lends to in-
dividuals, or invests his money in government-
securities ; for since, in the latter case, the total
amount of government-securities is not increased,
(the national debt remaining the same,) every

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purchase he makes sets free an equal amount,
which is sure to find its way into the hands of
some private borrower ; and, generally speaking,
of one who will employ this borrowed capital
productively^ in trade, agriculture, and manufac-
tures ; whereas if he had lived in what is called
a liberal style, most of what he has thus laid by
would have been expended unproductively, in
sumptuous dinners, the services of menials, race-
horses, hounds, and the like ; all of which would
have left behind no increase of the capital of the
country.

The individuals, however, who borrow the
miser's money, not only owe him no thanks,
as he had not their benefit in view, but are
in most instances unable even to refer that benefit
to him. We can no more trace the actual pro-
gress of each sum that is thus thrown into the
general capital of the country, than of the drops
of water of each shower that falls into the ocean ;
though it is demonstrable that the whole mass
of its waters must be increased by just so much.

Some points connected with the Subject I have
now briefly touched on, may, perhaps, present
difficulties to such as have not been in the habit

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of punsuing such inquiries. I shall take occasion
to advert to these points hereafter in their proper
place. But this slight notice of the subject was
introduced here, merely as affording a striking
instance of the manner in which, by the wise
arrangements of Providence, not only self-interest,
but in some instances even the most sordid
selfishness, are made, in an advanced stage of
society, to conduce to public prosperity.

I am indeed far enough from holding with
Mandeville, that on the whole, private vices
conduce to public prosperity. The Spendthrift
diminishes it ; and even the Miser, though his
evil disposition is generally turned by an over-
nding Providence to a good end, yet might lay
out his money much more beneficially still, if he
were to receive the endowment of judicious
public-spirit.

But the circumstance to which I wish to direct
your attention, is, the general tendency — a tend-
ency often interrupted and impeded indeed by
human faults and follies — but not wholly or
chiefly depending for its operation on human
virtue and wisdom — towards the advancement of
national wealth. The disturbing forces, as they

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may be called, of wars, and tumults, and mis-
govemment, I have not thought it necessary to
dwell upon in the outset. The character and
direction of the moving principle of a machine,
should be first understood generally, before we
attend to the impediments of friction and the
resistance of the air. And that in spite of all
impediments, the tendency I have been speaking
of does exist, and produce immensely important
results, every one must perceive, who con-
templates, for instance, the present condition of
this island, as compared with what it was when
our Anglo-Saxon ancestors were first settled in it.
As to the connection of what is usually called
national prosperityy with the advancement of
civilization, in the highest and most proper sense
— and as to the question, how far Dr. Mandevilte^s
doctrine, or its opposite, is true, that Virtue is
unfavourable to national Wealth, and national
Wealth to Virtue — although I have slightly ad-
verted to the subject already, and shall from time
to time recur to it as occask>n niay require—
this, is the subject which will occupy the neit
Lecture.

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LEC5TURE VIL

It appears that Society, when once placed in a
position removed a certain degree ahove utter
barbai^sm, has a tendency, so far as wars, unwise
institutions, imperfect and oppressive laws, and
other $uch obstacles, do not interfere, to advance,
in Wealth and in the Arts which pertain to
human life and enjoyment.

How far such an advancement is favourable
or unfavourable to that higher and better kind of
Civilization which consists in moral elevation
an4 improvement, is a digressive indeed, but a
very important, inquiry,* and one intimately
coimected at least with the subject before us.

At first, the division of labour would be but
imperfect, and mutual intercourse between dif-
ferent parts of the country, difficult and limited.
In each of the scattered viUages, several different
arts would be exercised, with a very humble

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degree of skill, by the same person. Much
labour would be wasted, through the want of
tools, the clumsiness of implements, and the
unskilfulness of workmen ; and though the total
produce of labour would be far less in proportion
than in such a country, for instance, as ours,
there would be a much smaller proportion of
persons who could enjoy an exemption from
bodily labour ; and the leisure again which some
would enjoy, would conduce, but in a compara-
tively small degree, to their intellectual advance-
ment ; from their living within a confined circle,
and wanting, in great measure, the excitement
and the help of mutual communication.

Subsequently, the advances which would be
made in neglect of each of these points, would
all re-act on each other. Increasing division of
labour, would lead to an increase of exchanges,
and this, to the employment of money; and
these latter improvements would, in turn, pro-
mote the first. All of these causes would tend to
produce and to improve, roads, canals, and also
navigation, and other means of conveyance for
goods and persons ; and this facilitation of inter-
course again, both within the country, and with

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foreign nations, would re-act upon its causes, and
accelerate that increase of capital from which it
had sprung.

And thus a larger proportion of the Commu-
nity, and that of a much more numerous Com-
munity, would be at leisure from mere mecha-
nical toil, and would be enabled to turn their
attention to some more refined sources of enjoy-
ment than mere sensual indulgence ; while their
mutual intercourse would at once facilitate the
improvement of their faculties by mutual collision,
and at the same time direct the emulation of
many of them into a new channel. Some, in-
deed, of the wealthier members of the Com-
mxmity would vie with each other merely in
sumptuous feasts, and splendour of dress, or in
the most frivolous accomplishments : but others
again would be incited to direct, either their chief
attention, or, at least, some part of it, towards
the pursuit of knowledge ; either with a view to
some practical end, or for its own sake.

And here, again, we may perceive the bene^
volent wisdom of Providence, in not making the
public good dependent on pure public-spirit. He
who labours to acquire, and then to communi- i

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fcate, important knowledge, solely, or principaUy,
with a view to the benefit of his fellow-creatures,
is a character more admirable than it is common.
Knowledge would not have made the advances it
has, if it had been promoted only by such persons.
Far the greater part of it may be considered as
the gift, not of human, but of divine, benevolence;
which has implanted in man a thirst after know-
ledge for its own sake, accompanied with a sort
of instinctive desire to impart it. For I think
there is in man, independent of the desire of
admiration, (called, in its faulty excess, Vanity ,)
which is a most powerful stimulus to the ac-
quisition and propagation of knowledge — inde-
pendent of this, I say, there is, connected with
the desire of gaining knowledge, a desire
(founded, I imagine, on Sympathy) o£ com-
municating it to others, as an ultimate end.
This, and also the love of display, are, no doubt,
inferior motives, and will be superseded by a
higher principle, in proportion as the individual
advances in moral excellence. These motives
constitute, as it were, a kind of scaffolding, which
should be taken down by little and little, as the
perfect building advances, but which is of indis-

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pensable use till that is completed. To these
inferior motives then, (which those who delight
in degrading human nature, by applying to each
propensity a name implying something faulty
or contemptible, would call. Curiosity and Vanity,)
— ^to these, with an intermixture greater or less
of higher motives, we owe the chief part of the
progress of society in knowledge. ^

Ulterior objects of utility do also contribute
to supply motives. It is proverbial, that "Ne-
cessity is the Mother of Invention :" but the
inventions thence originating will usually be of
a simple and rude character. The barbarous
and semi-barbarous nations, which are the most
necessitous — ^the most frequently impelled to
exert their faculties under this harsh instructress,
have little to boast of in their contrivances, com-
pared with those which arise in a more advanced
stage of society. On those, however, who are
not under the pressure of mere necessity, the
desire of gain has often operated to sharpen their
faculties and to extend their knowledge. But it is
not solely, or even chiefly, by an ulterior view to
profit, that men have been incited to the pursuit
of knowledge. On the contrary, it is, as Cicero

N

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observes, when men are released from the avoca-
tions of necessary busmess, that they are espe-
cially led to fix their desires on the hearing, the
learning, the investigating, of whatever is attrac-
tive through its intrinsic grandeur or its novelty.
** Cum sumus necessariis negotiis curisque vacui,
turn, avemus aUquid videre, audire, ac discere;
cognitionemque rerum aut occultarum, aut ad-
mirabilium, ad beate vivendum necessariam du-
cimus/

Accordingly, many of the discoveries which
have proved the most useful, were probably the
result of investigations not conducted with a
view to utility. Those who first watched the
ecUpses of Jupiter's satellites, had probably no
thought of the impc»rtant aid to navigation to
which their observations were to lead. But
indirectly^ and as subsidiary to the thirst for
knowledge, the desire of gain has led to very
important results in this branch of improvement.
The most important, perhaps, of all inventions,
is that of a paper, sufficiently cheap to allow of its
general use; for the introduction of printing
would speedily spring from this, to meet the
demand for books ; and indeed, some contrivance

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of the nature of printing is extremely obvious,,
and, though in an imperfect state, was known
long before ; but could never be extensively ap-
plied, till a sufficiently cheap material for books
should be invented. Now these arts were pro-
bably devised with a view to the profit of the
inventors; but it was the demand for literary
productions that must have held out the hope of
this profit.

Knowledge then, and intellectual cultivation
and refinement, being thus advanced, would,
from the nature of the case, continually tend, as
well as national wealth, towards a still further
increase, without any limits that we are able to
assign.

And such a state of things one would cer-
tainly, at the first glance, expect to be, on the
whole, favourable rather than not to the moral
improvement of mankind. The presumptions are
manifestly on the affirmative side. For in the
first place, there is one antecedent presumption,
firom what we know of the divine dispensations,
both natural and supernatural. I am aware,
what caution is called for in any attempt to
reason a priori from ouc notions of the character

N 2

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and designs of the Supreme Being. But in this
case there is a clear analogy before us. We
know that God placed the Human Species in
such a situation, and endued them with such
faculties and propensities, as would infallibly
tend to the advancement of Society in wealth,
and in all the arts of life; instead of either
creating Man a diflFerent kind of Being, or leav-
ing him in that wild and uninstructed state,
from which, as we have seen, he could never
have emerged. Now if the natural consequence
of this advancement be a continual progress from
bad to worse — ^if the increase of wealth, and the
development of the intellectual powers, tend, not
to the improvement, but rather to the deprava-
tion, of the moral character — we may safely pro-
nounce this to be at variance with all analogy; —
a complete reversal of every other appointment
that we see throughout creation. And it is com-
pletely at variance with the revealed will of Grod.
For, the great impediments to the progress I am
speaking of are, war and dissention of every
kind, insecurity of property — indolence and neg-
lect of providing for ourselves, and for those
dependent on us. Now God has forbidden Man

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to kill, and to steal; He has inculcated on him
gentleness, honesty, submission to lawfiil autho-
rity, and industry in providing for his own house-
hold : if therefore the advancement in national
wealth, which is found to be, by the appoint-
ment of Providence, the result of obedience to
these precepts — if, I say, this advancement na-
turally tends to counteract that improvement of
the moral character, which the same God has
pointed out to us as the great business of this
life, it is impossible to avoid the conclusion, that
He has given contradictory commands; — that
He has directed us to pursue a course of action,
which leads to an end the very opposite of what
we are required to aim at.

In the next place, it may be observed, that, as
the tendencies towards selfishness and rapacity —
cruelty — deceit — sensuality — and all other vices,
exist in all mankind in every state of society;
so, the counteracting and restraining principles,
of Prudence, Morality, and Religion, will have the
less or the more sway, (speaking generally, and
taking a society in the mass,) according as each
community is less or more advanced from a state
of rude and barbarian ignorance. Savages, it

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should be remembered, and all men in proportion
as they approach the condition of savages, are
men in respect of their passions^ while, in intellect^
they are children. Those who speak of a state
x)f nature, i. e. of uncultivated nature, as one of
pure and virtuous simplicity, and regard vice as
something introduced, imported, and artificial, are
ignorant of what they might learn from observa-
tion, and even from consciousness, as well as
from Scripture — the corruption of human na-
ture. The actual existence of this — ^the prone-
ness, i. e. of Man to let the baser propensities
bear rule over Reason and Conscience, and to
misdirect his conduct accordingly — this corrup-
tion, or original-sin, or frailty, or sinfulness, or
whatever name it may be called by, is, I say, in
respect of its actual existence, not a matter of
Revelation, (any more than that the sun gives
light by day,) but of experience. What Revela-
tion does teach us is, that it is not to be accounted
for merely by bad education, unwise laws, excess
of artificial refinement, or any such cause, but
arises from something inherent in the human
breast ; inasmuch as we have before us the re-
corded case of those who fell from a state of

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innocence, when none of those other causes
existed.

Human nature then being such, it is idle to
expect that it will remain pure by being merely
left uncultivated ; — that noxious weeds will not
spring up in it, unless the seeds of them are
brought, and artificially sown. The contrivance
mentioned by Herodotus of that Queen of Ba-
bylon, who removed every night the bridge over
the Euphrates, that the inhabitants of the oppo-
site sides might not pass over to rob each other,
was not more preposterous than the idea of main-
taining virtue among men by precluding them
from mutual intercourse, and keeping them se-
cluded from each other, in a state of barbarian
rudeness and ignorance.

If it be true that Man's duty coincides with
his real interest both in this world and the next,
the better he is qualified by intellectual culture,
and diffusion of knowledge, to understand his
duty, and his interests, the greater prospect there
would seem to be (other points being equal) of
his moral improvement. For, that Integrity, Tem-
perance, and other Virtues, which often require
us to forego present gratification, do, in the long

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run, conduce to our temporal prosperity and
enjoyment, is a truth which is perceived more
and more as our views become enlarged ; and
cannot b? comprehended at all by those who are
so dull and unthinking as hardly to look beyond
the passing moment.

If again our religion be true, and be important
for the amelioration of mankind, it must be im-
portant that the knowledge of it should be
diffused, and enUghtened views of it entertained.
Now as a very poor Community is likely to be a
comparatively ignorant one, (since men univer-
sally occupied in a difficult struggle to subsist,
must have little leisure and little inclination for
intellectual culture,) so, the religion of a very
ignorant people must always be a gross and
debasing superstition, either inoperative on their
conduct, or mischievous in its operation. Chris-
tianity is designed, and is calculated, for all
mankind, except savages and such as are but
little removed above the savage state. Men are
not indeed (unhappily) always the better Chris-
tians in proportion as they advance in refinement
and intellectual cultivation : these are even com*
patible with utter irreligion. But all experience

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shews, that a savage (though he may be trained to
adore a crucifix or an image of the Virgin) cannot
be a Christian. In all the successful eflforts of
Missionaries among savages, civilization and con-
version have gone hand in hand.

In the next place it may be observed, that
agricultural improvement, accumulation of capital,
commercial resources, and the other results of
national wealth, afford the best preservative
against the calamity of occasional famines; —
such extremities, I mean, of famine, as (with all
the distresses occasioned among us by unfavour-
able seasons) we have no notion of but by de-
scription : — such famines as, if you look back to
the history of ruder times, you will see noticed
as of no unfrequent occurrence. Now nothing,
perhaps, tends more to deteriorate the human
character than the pressure (especially a sudden
pressure) of severe distress; — ''malesuada fames,"
as the Poet calls it. Even great part of the cor-
ruption of morals induced by War, is through the
mediuni of the sudden indigence to which men
are reduced by its ravages. '' In peace and
prosperity y'' says Thucydides, ** men are better
disposed; from their not being driven into

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distressing difficulties, but War is a severe in-
structor, {fiUuog Si&wrxoAo;, nearly answering to Vir-
gil's '* malesuada fames,") and, depriving them of
the abundant supply of their daily wants, tends to
make the moral character of the generality con-
formable to the existing st^te of things '*."

In the last place, you may observe what a
security is afforded to a Community advanced in
wealth, in the use of artillery, and the science
of the engineer, against that most demoralizing^
as well as otherwise frightful, calamity, the over-
running of a civilized nation by hordes of Barba-
rians; which happened to the Roman empire,
and led to that dismal and degraded period
known by the name of the Dark Ages. From
the recurrence of precisely such an event, the
civilized world is secured, through the arts con-
nected with the use of gunpowder. These arts,
as experience has shewn, have not rendered
wars more frequent or more destructive; and
though wars still occur, to the disgrace of ra-

i^ittrm u^tifVi rttf yvtifcuf t^ovrt, ^tti ro ft»» If uKOvriovf tifeiytcas

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tional Beings and of Christians, their ravages,
frightful as they are, produce no effect com-
parable to the subjugation of a civilized nation
by a tribe of Huns. It may be observed, how-
ever, in addition, that commerce between different
nations, (which is both an effect and a cause of
national wealth,) by making them mutually de-
pendent, tends to lessen their disposition to go
to war. Many wars have indeed been occasioned
by commercial jealousy ; but it will be found,
that in almost every instance this has arisen,
on one side, if not on both, from unsound views
of Political-Economy, which have occasioned the
general interests of the community to a very
great amount to be sacrificed for a much smaller
advantage to a few individuals. The ruinous
expensiveness also of war (which will never be
adequately estimated till the spread of civilization
shall have gained general admission for just
views of Political-Economy) would alone, if
fairly computed, be almost sufficient to banish
war from the earth.

On the whole, then, there seems every reason
to believe, that, as a general rule, that advance-

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ment in National Prosperity which mankind are,
by the Governor of the universe, adapted, and
impelled, to promote, must be favourable to
moral improvement. Still more does it appear
evident, that such a conclusion must be acceptable
to a pious and philanthropic mind. If it is not
probable, still less is it desirable, that the Deity
should have fitted and destined society to make
a continual progress, impeded only by slothful
and negligent habits, by war, rapine, and op-
pression, (in short, by violations of divine com-
mands,) which progress inevitably tends towards
a greater and greater moral corruption.

And yet there are some who appear not only
to think, but to wish to think, that a condition
but little removed from the savage state — one
of ignorance, grossness, and poverty — unen-
lightened, semi-barbarous, and stationary, is the
most favourable to virtue. You will meet with
persons who will be even offended if you attempt
to awaken them from their dreams about primi-
tive rural simplicity, and to convince them that
the spread of civilization, which, they must see,
has a tendency to spread, does not tend to in-

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crease depravity. Supposing their notion true,
it must at least, one would think, be a melan-
choly truth.

It may be said, as a reason not for wishing,
but for believing this, that the moral dangers
which beset a wealthy community are designed
as a trial. Undoubtedly they are ; since no
state in which Man is placed is exempt from
trials. And let it be admitted also if you will,
that the temptations to evil, to which civihzed
Man is exposed, are, absolutely, stronger than
those which exist in a ruder state of society ;
still, if they are also relatively stronger — stronger
in proportion to the counteracting forces, and
stronger than the augmented motives to good
conduct — and are such, consequently, that, as
Society advances in civilization, there is less and.
less virtue, and a continually decreasing prospect
of its being attained — this amounts to something
more than a state of trial : it is a distinct pro-
vision made by the Deity for the moral degra-
dation of his rational creatures.

This can hardly be a desirable conclusion:
but if it be nevertheless a true one, (and our
wishes should not be allowed to bias our judg-

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ment,) those who hold it, ought at least to follow
it up in practice, by diminishing, as far as is
possible, the severity of the trial. There is no
virtue in exposing ourselves to temptations which
may be avoided ; — in cultivating, or neglecting
to extirpate, the poisonous night-shade with its
tempting and deadly berries. Let Mandevillians
read the Fable of the Bees, and advocate the
measures which the Author, in conclusion, (I
myself am inclined to think, sincerely, but at
any rate, consistently,) recommends. Let us put
away from us '' the accursed thing.'' If national
wealth be, in a moral point of view, an evil, let
us, in the name of all that is good, set about to
diminish it. Let us, as he advises, bum our
fleets, block up our ports, destroy our manu-
factories, break up our roads, and betake our-
selves to a life of frugal and rustic simplicity;
like Mandeville's bees, who

** flew into a hollow tree,
** Blest with content and honesty."

^ I will conclude this Lecture with some brief

remarks, intended merely to suggest matter for

i your own consideration, on the principal causes

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which have led to an erroneous estimate of the'
superior virtue of a poor and half-civilized con-
dition of society.

One powerful, but little-suspected cause, I
take to be, an early familiarity with poetical
descriptions, of pure, unsophisticated, rustic life,
in remote, sequestered, and unenUghtened, dis-
tricts ; — of the manly virtue and practical wisdom
of our simple forefathers, before the refinements
of luxury had been introduced ; — of the adven-
turous wildness, so stimulating to the imagina-
tion, of savage or pastoral life, in the midst of
primaeval forests, lofty mountains, and all the,
grand scenery of uncultivated nature. Such
subjects and scenes are much better adapted for
Poets than thronged cities, work-shops, coal-pits,
and iron-founderies. And Poets, whose object
is to please, of course keep out of sight all the
odious or disgusting circumstances pertaining to
the Ufe of the savage or the untutored clown,
and dwell exclusively on all the amiable and
admirable parts of that simpUcity of character
which they feign or fancy. Early association!^
are thus formed; whose influence is often the
stronger and the more lasting, from the very ^

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; circumstance that they are formed unconsciously,
and do not come in the form of propositions
demanding a deliberate assent. Poetry does not
profess to aim at conviction ; but it often leaves
impressions ^hich affect the Reasoning and the
Judgment. And a false impression is perhaps
oftener conveyed in other ways, than by sophis-
tical argument ; because that rouses the mind to
exert its powers, and to assume, as it were, a

I reasoning mood ^\

The very senses, again, in such as possess a
taste for rural scenery, aid in such associations.
A thatched cottage on a flowery heath, and the
border of a fine wood, or the bark-covered sheds
of Indians, amidst the noble forests and rivers of
America, are more picturesque objects, than a
comfortable brick-house, near a turnpike-road,
and surrounded with corn-fields. And the ima-
gination is led to suggest the connection of what

** In a very recent publication I have seen mention made of
a person who discovered the falsity of a certain doctrine
(which, by the way, is nevertheless a true one; instinctively.
This kind of instinct; i. e. the habit of forming opinions at
the suggestion rather of feeling than of reason, is very
common.

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is morally, with what is physically beautiful. In
the account of a youth who was bom blind, and
couched by Mr. Chapeldon, it is mentioned, that
he was greatly astonished at not finding, as he
had expected, that the persons and other objects,
which had been the naost agreeable to him in
other respects, were also the most pleasing to
the sight. The converse of this mistake may, in
a certain degree, be found in many. Not a few
who have passed good part of their lives in the
country, and travelled through regions celebrated
for wild and romantic scenery, know in fact very
little of the character of men in any class of life
but their own, except from the descriptions of
poets ; but take for granted that the picturesque
Novels of mountaineers must be the abode of
nothing but peaceful innocence and felicity, and
must have much the advantage in this respect
of a smoky and bustling town. Maxagla-avrig

vfMov TO ctfjreigiKUKOV, 06 ^ijXoujjxsv TO i^gov.

Moreover, travellers have sometimes, without
any design to deceive, given very overcharged
pictures of the moral state of savage or half-
civilized nations; whom they have perhaps
chanced to see under favourable circumstances ;

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and (hen, reporting faithftiUy what came under
their observation, have suppUed the rest from
their own conjectures.

Another cause which powerfully cooperates
with the foregoing, is, that those who are them-
selves members of a wealthy and civilized com-
munity, know all the vices and other evils which
prevail in such a community ; while, of those
existing in a different state of things, they are
ignorant. And when vexed and mortified at the
evils we see among ourselves, the feeling which
Horace describes in reference to a different point,
the disposition to imagine others better off than
ourselves, (laudet di versa sequentes,) induces us to
think that another state of society may be exempt
from such evils; inasmuch as we are sure it cannot
have the very same. Avarice, for instance, we
commonly denote by the phrase, **love of money;''
and hence we are led to imagine, that a people
among whom there is no money y must be free from
avarice : and so in other points. In other in-
stances again it will be found, that the vices to
which civilized men are liable, are really different
in kind fi:om those of the imcultivated ; and,
though the latter are not the less in reality vices,

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or, necessarily, of the less magnitude, they are
more likely to be overlooked by those whose
attention has been habitually directed to a dif-
ferent class of faults*

It is wonderful what an apparently strong case f
may, on this principle, be made out against any
given form of Society, by dwelling, in a style of
eloquent declamation, on all the follies and crimes
existing in it, described according to the parti-^
cular shape they assume in that particular society ;
thus leading the unreflective reader to forget,
that faults substantially the same, or equivalent
ones, may exist no less in other forms of Society
also. A beautiful specimen of this kind of arti-
fice may be found in Burke's ** Defense of Natural
Society," written in the assumed person of Lord
Bolingbroke, to expose the same kind of sophistry
employed by that author against religion. t

There is also probably much error occasioned
by a fallacy so obvious as soon as noticed, that
hardly any one ever suspects himself of a liability
to be misled by it ; that, I mean, of neglecting
to take into account in our calculations, the
relative numbers of the persons we are speaking
of. Since increase of national wealth is, I believe

o2

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1 may say, always accompanied by an increase
of population, it is evident that unless allowance
be made for this, when we are computing the
amount of crime in two countries, the result
will always be unduly favourable to the poorer
community.

We must be improved incredibly, if the ab-
solute amount of crime in this island is not
greater that when its population was, perhaps,
one-fifth of what it now is. In any one of
the United States of America, the number of
persons tried and convicted of offences, probably
equals or exceeds the whole population of the
tribes of wild Indians, who formerly wandered
over the same district. In the same way, men
are liable to form an over-estimate of the purity
of morals in the Country, as compared with a
town ; or in a barren and thinly-peopled, as
compared with a fertile and populous, district.
On a given area, it must always be expected, that
the absolute amount of vice will be greater in a
Town than in the Country -, so also will be that
of virtue : but the proportions of the two must
be computed on quite different principles. A
physician of great skill and in high repute, pro-

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bably loses many more patients than an ordinary
practitioner; but this proves nothing, till we
have ascertained the comparative numbers of
their patients. Yet this, which is as clear when
stated as any arithmetical proportion can be,
is often, through inadvertency, overlooked in
other cases as well as this ; and important prac-
tical mistakes are frequently the result.

It should be observed also, that in large towns,
and in populous districts intersected by roads
which furnish a rapid conveyance of intelligence
from place to place, and where newspapers are
in common use, much more in proportion is
knovm of every enormity that is perpetrated than
in remote country-districts, thinly peopled, where
there is less facility of mutual communication,
and where the natural appetite for news is com-
pelled to limit itself to the gossip of the nearest
hamlet. Much apparent increase of crime (I will
not undertake to say how much) consists, I am
convinced^ in the increase of newspapers. For
crimes, especially (be it observed) such as are the
most remote from the experience of each individual^
and therefore strike him as something strange,
always furnish interesting articles of intelligence.

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I have no doubt that a single murder in Great
Britain has often furnished matter for discourse
to more than twenty times as many persons as
any twenty such murders would in Turkey ^
We should remember, that there are not more
particles of dust in the sunbeam than in any other
part of the room; though we see them more
where the light is stronger.

On the whole then, I think we may conclude,
that the notions of those who consider a poor
and imperfectly civilized community as possess-
ing, caeteris paribus, superior or even equal ad-
vantages in point of moral improvement, are as
much opposed to reason and to experience, as
they are to every rational wish : and that as the
Most High has evidently formed Society with
a tendency to advancement in National Wealth,
so, He has designed and fitted us, to advance, by
means of that, in Virtue, and true Wisdom, and
Happiness.

But every situation in which Man can be
placed has, along with its own peculiar advan-
tages, its own peculiar difficulties and trials also ;
which we are called on to exert our faculties
in providing against. The most fertile soil does

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not necessarily bear the most abundant harvest ;
its weeds, if neglected, wUl grow the rankest.
And the servant who has received but one
talent, if he put it out to use, will fare better
than he who has been entrusted with five, if
he squander or bury them. But still, this last
does not suffer because he received five talents ;
but because he has not used them to advantage.

I am far from thinking, that any nation has
realized as fully as it might have done, and may
yet do, the picture I have drawn of the apparent
design of a bountiful Providence; — that men
have availed themselves of the advantages which
increased and increasing national wealth holds
out, in respect of moral advancement, to the
extent to which they would, if these advantages
had been duly contemplated, as such.

Some remarks on the difficulties and dangers
most peculiar to a wealthy community, and on
the faults which its members are most apt to
commit, in not rightly availing themselves of its
peculiar advantages — in not rightly estimating
those duties, and guarding against those dangers,
which are especially connected with such a state

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of things — in short, in not acting conformably
to the situation in which they are placed — will
form the subject of the next Lecture.

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LECTURE VIII.

I HAVE all along spoken of the possession of
National Wealth, as more favourable than poverty,
to moral improvement, supposing other points
equal. For there are several other points in
which such inequalities may exist as shall affect
the result. Wise or unwise, Laws and Customs,
a better or worse Religion, and other such
variations of circumstances, do indeed tend to
make a great difference as to the advancement of
z, society in wealth ; but they also make a dif-
ference as to the results of its wealth ; so that
National Prosperity is not every where in an
exact ratio to intellectual culture and refinement
of manners ; nor these, again, to the moral con-
dition of the society. Two nations may be equal in
wealth, yet unequal in the higher and better part
of civilization; or the superiority may even be
on the side of the poorer. But when this is the

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case, that superiority must be attributed to some
other cause rather than to poverty ; if, at least,
the general conclusion be just, which, I have
endeavoured to shew, is deducible, both from a
consideration of the nature of Man, and from a
wide observation. To argue hastily from a
scanty induction, leads to the fallacy described
by Logicians under the title of ** non causa pro
causa;" by which the incautious are often brought
to mistake even an impediment in spite of which
some effect has been produced, for the very cause
of that effect.

And such would be our procedure, if, on ob-
serving some poorer community to be more
moral and enUghtened than a richer one, we
should attribute this difference to their com-
parative degrees of wealth, and should advise,
as Mandeville does, a voluntary impoverishment,
as the expedient for improving morals*.

^ The Lady who was exhibited some time ago, who being
bom without arms or legs, practised needlework, painting,
and other arts, notwithstanding the deficiency, did indeed
absolutely excel many whose bodily conformation is perfect :
but those who are conscious of inferiority to her in those arts,
would not be therefore recommended to throw away their

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But it is neceesary here to premise, that when
I speak of national wealth as an advantage with
a view to moral improvement, I mean, wealth in
proportion to the population. This seems suffi-
ciently obvious ; but it is yet necessary to be
mentioned, because other views of the compara-
tive wealth of different communities are often
taken ; and that, very suitably, when the ques-
tions at issue are different. If any one, for
instance, were speaking of the wealth requisite
for the building and maintenance of a Navy, or
the erection of some public edifice, or other
national work, he would place the Russian Em-
pire far above such States as Hamburgh, or
Geneva ; though they are, in proportion to their
population, much richer.

Again, for other purposes, the wealth of a
nation would be computed according to that of
the richest individuals. A dealer, for' instance,
in the most costly pictures, statues, or jewels,
might find, that in a given Country he could
not dispose of his most valuable articles : this or

natural advantages, but to make the most of them ; — to aim
at greater proficiency by learning to employ their hands, not
by cutting them off.

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that people, he would say, is too poor to pur-
chase such thmgs ; and he might find a ready
sale for these in another country, whose col-
lective wealth, in proportion to its population,
might be much less, but great part of it distri-
buted in larger masses among a few individuals.
It is evident, that for our present purpose, it is
the wealth of the people generally, not of a few
individuals, that is to be considered.

With equal wealth however, and in the same
sense of the phrase, different communities may
be considerably unequal. in the most important
points of civilization, from various causes ; most
of which do indeed exert a considerable influ-
ence, even in respect of wealth itself, but yet
have, besides this, a direct effect also on the na-
tional character, and tend to promote, or retard,
or entirely stop, the advancement of a people
in intelligence, or in morality, or in both.

The character of their religion, for instance,
makes a great difference : and in this respect the
most eminent nations of antiquity laboured under
a great disadvantage, as compared with those of
Christendom; and of these, such as are en-
thralled by the superstitions of the Greek and

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Romish Churches, are far from being on a level
with those who have approached nearer to the
religion of the Bible. To the difiusion of know-
ledge, in particular, Romanism is even more
opposed than Paganism itself; which (as a re-
ligious system) may be considered as indifferent
to it; while evangeUcal religion absolutely re-
quires it, since it cannot be really embraced
without a certain degree of education. The
direct effects of religion on national character,
few will be disposed to deny, even of those who
believe in no reUgion ; since of several different
forms of superstitious error, supposing all re-
Ugions to be such, one may at least be more
compatible with moral improvement than an-
other.

Not however that religion has not an indirect
effect also, through its influence on national
Prosperity. To take one point out of many:
War, which, if Christianity were heartily and
generally embraced, would be wholly unknown,
has been, even as it is, much mitigated by that
humanizing influence. Now War is, in the pre-
sent day, generally regarded, though to a far
less degree than it really is, as a great destroyer

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oi wealth. But the direct demoralizing effect of
War is probably still greater than its impoverish-
ing effect. The same may be said of Slavery^
in its various forms, including the serfship of the
Russians, and, I believe, the Hungarians. If
both Slavery and War were at an end, the wealth
of nations would increase, but their civilization
in the most unportant points would increase in a
still greater ratio.

If again there be a community whose found-
ation has been laid with a population chiefly con-
sisting of the worst kind of slaves — transported
criminals, the scum and refuse of another coun-
try, (which Lord Bacon long ago proclaimed to
be ** a wicked and unblessed thing,") and if, from
time to time, fresh supplies be poured into it, of
the sweepings of jails — such a community, though
its natural advantages of soil, climate, and situa*
tion, may enable it nevertheless to advance in
wealth, must have but a wretched prospect in
respect of moral improvement*". And if a
colony, so constituted, prove, not so much a
place of dreaded punishment to the convicts sent

^ See article " Transportation/' in No. 1. of the London
Review.

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out to it, as a nursery of vice, sending back,
from time to time, such as have become the
most thorough proficients in villainy, the moral
condition of the mother-country also, must suffer
from the operation of the system.

A community, again, would, caeteris paribus,
labour under a great disadvantage in respect of
advancement in virtue at least, whose institu-
tions were such as tended to arm against the
laws large bodies of such persons as were not, in
the outset, destitute of all moral principle, but
whose mode of life was a fit training to make
them become so. Such are. Poachers and Smug-
glers- An excessive multiplication of the latter
class is produced by the enactment of laws,
whose object is, not revenue, but the exclusion
of foreign productions for the supposed benefit
of domestic industry. Whatever may be thought
of the expediency of those laws, with a view to
national wealth, all must agree, that the exten-
sion of smuggling must produce the most demo-
ralizing effects.

Again, among nations equal in wealth, the
greatest and most important varieties may exist
in respect of its distribution. If a large propor-

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tion of the wealth of a community consist of the
enormous and overgrown fortunes of a few, that
community has by no means such promising
prospects in respect of the intellectual and moral
advancement of the rest of the people, or even of
the possessors of those fortunes, with one which
enjoys a greater difiusion of wealth. '* That state
of society," (says the late Professor in his Intro-
ductory Lecture,) ** in which the productive-
ness of labour, and the mode in which it is
applied, secure to the labouring classes all the
necessaries and some of the conveniences of life,
seems to be, not merely conducive, but essential,
both to their morals and their happiness."

AgGun, it is a point of the highest importance
in many respects, what course the prevailing
current of expenditure takes in a nation of con-
siderable wealth. And in this point different
ages and countries exhibit great diversities. In
some, the favourite, and, in short, most fashion-
able style of expenditure shall be in masques
and pageants, feasts, and fire-works, and things
of that nature, which perish in the very act of
using; in others, in sumptuous dress, which
is but a little less perishable; in others again.

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in furniture; or again, in buildings, paintings,
libraries, and museums. It will be apparent on
a detailed and extensive survey, that every ad-
vance from a more gross or puerile, to a more
refined and tasteful, and at the same time more
rational and useful, style of expenditure, is both
the efi)^ct, and again also a cause, of a general
advance in civilization. A coarse profusion in
the most perishable articles, and again, the de-
light in a tawdry kind of splendour, and shewy
ornament, are characteristics of a semi-barbarous
people.

These however, and several other circum-
stances which tend to produce inequality in
different communities in respect of moral ad-
vancement, it will be sufficient to have thus,
generally and briefly, pointed out to your notice.

The points which more particularly claim our
attention at present, are, those circumstances
more immediately connected with national wealth,
which may prove unfavourable to national mo-
rality.

The first of these is, one result of the division
of labour when carried to a great extent ; — the
evil of reducing each man too much to the

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condition of a mere machine, or rather of one
part of a machine ; the result of which is, that
the mind is apt to be narrowed — the intellectual
faculties undeveloped, or imperfectly and par-
tially developed, through the too great con-
centration of the attention on the performance
of a single, and sometimes very simple, ope-
ration.

With respect to this point, I cannot perhaps
do better than to cite the rems^s of A. Smith
on the evil in question, and on the remedy pro-
posed for it. ** In the progress of the division
of l^>mir, the employment of the far greater part
of^those who live by labour, that is, of the great
body of the people, comes to be confined to a
few very simple operations ; frequently to one
or two. But the understandings of the greater
part of men are necessarily formed by their or-
dinary employments. The man whose whole life
is spent in performing a few simple operations,
of which the eflFects too are, perhaps, always
the same, or very nearly the same, has no occa-
sion to exert his understanding, or to exercise
his invention in finding out expedients for re-
moving difficulties which never occur. He na-

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turally loses, therefore, the habit of such exertion,
and generally becomes as stupid and ignorant
as it is possible for a human creature to become.
The torpor of his mind renders him, not only
incapable of relishing or bearing a part in any
rational conversation, but of conceiving any
generous, noble, or tender sentiment, and con-
sequently of forming any just judgment concern-
ing many even of the ordinary duties of private
life. Of the great and extensive interests of his
country he is altogether incapable of judging ;
and unless very particular pains have been taken
to render him otherwise, he is equally incapable
of defending his country in war. The uniformity

of his stationary life i;enders him incapable of

exerting his strength with vigour and perse-
verance, in any other employment than that to
which he has been bred. His dexterity at his
own particular trade seems, in this manner, to
be acquired at the expence of his intellectual,
social, and martial virtues. But in every im-
proved and civilized society this is the state into
which the labouring poor, that is, the great body
of the people, must necessarily fall, unless go-
vernment takes some pains to prevent it.

p2

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*' It is otherwise in the barbarous societies, as
they are commonly called, of hunters, of shep-
herds, and even of husbandmen in that rude state
of husbandry which precedes the improvement
of manufactures, and the extension of foreign
commerce. In such societies the varied occupa-
tions of every man oblige every man to exert his
capacity, and to invent expedients for removing
difficulties which are continually occurring. In-
vention is kept alive, and the mind is not suflfered
to fall into that drowsy stupidity, which, in a
civilized society, seems to benumb the under-
standing of almost all the inferior ranks of people.
.... In such a society indeed, no man can well ac-
quire that improved and refined understanding,
which a few men sometimes possess in a more
civilized state. Though in a rude society there
is a good deal of variety in the occupations of
every individual, there is not a great deal in
those of the whole society. Every man does,
or is capable of doing, almost every thing which
any other man does, or is capable of doing.
Every man has a considerable degree of know-
ledge, ingenuity, and invention ; but scarce
any man has a great degree. The degree, how-

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ever, which is commonly possessed, is generally
sufficient for conducting the whole simple busi-
ness of the society. In a civilized state, on
tthe contrary, though there is little variety in the
occupations of the greater part of individuals,
there is an almost infinite variety in those of the
whole society. These varied occupations present
an almost infinite variety of objects to the con-
templation of those few, who, being attached to
no particular occupation themselves, have leisure
and inclination to examine the occupations of
other people. The contemplation of so great a
variety of objects necessarily exercises their minds
in endless comparisons and combinations, and
renders their understandings, in an extraordinary
degree, both acute and comprehensive. Unless
those few, however, happen to be placed in some
very particular situations, their great abilities,
though honourable to themselves, may contribute
very little to the good government or happiness
of their society. Notwithstanding the great abi-
lities of those few, all the nobler parts of the
human character may be, in a great measure,
obliterated and extinguished in the great body of
the people.

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*•' The education of the common people re-
(uires, perhaps, in a civilised and commercial
society, the attention of the public more than

that of people of some rank and fortune The

conmion people have little time to spare for educa^-
tion. Their parents can scarce afford to maintain
them even in infancy. As soon as they are able to
work, they must apply to some trade by which
they can earn their subsistence. That trade too
is generally so simple and uniform as to give
little exercise to the understanding ; while, at
the same time, their labour is both so constant
and so severe, that it leaves them little leisure
and less inclination to apply to, or even to think
of, any thing else.

*' But though the common people cannot, in
any civilized society, be so well instructed as
people of some rank and fortune, the most essen-
tial parts of education, however, to read, write,
and account, can be acquired at so early a
period of life, that the greater part even of those
who are to be bred to the lowest occupations)
have time to acquire them before they can be
employed in those occupations. For a very small
^xpence the public can facilitate, can encourage.

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and can even impose upon almost the whole
body of the people, the necessity of acquiring
those most essential parts of education.

'* The public can facilitate this acquisition, by
establishing in every parish or district a little
school, where children may be taught for a re-
ward so moderate, that even a common labourer
may afford it ; the master being partly, but not
wholly, paid by the public ; because, if he was
wholly, or even principally paid by it, he would
soon learn to neglect his business. In Scotland
the establishment of such parish schools has
taught almost the whole common people to read,
and a very great proportion of them to write and
account. In England the establishment of charity
schools has had an eifect of the same kind, though
not so universally, because the establishment is
not so universal. If in those little schools the
books, by which the children are taught to read,
were a little more instructive than they commonly
are ; and if, instead of a little smattering of Latin,
which the children of the common people are
sometimes taught there, and which can scarce
ever be of any use to them ; they were instructed
in the elementary parts of geometry and me-*

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cbanics, the literary education of this rank of
people would perhaps be as complete as it can be.
There is scarce a common trade which does not
afford some opportunities of applying to it the
principles of geometry and mechanics, and which
would not therefore gradually exercise and im-
prove the common people in those principles,
the necessary introduction to the most sublime
as well as to the most useful sciences.

** The public can encourage the acquisition of
these most essential parts of education by giving
small premiums, and little badges of distinction,
to the children of the common pebple who excel
in them.

'' The pubUc can impose upon almost the whole
body of the people, the necessity of acquiring
those most essential parts of education, by oblig-
ing every man to undergo an examination or
probation in them before he can obtain the
freedom in any corporation, or be allowed to
set up any trade, either in a village, or town
corporate*."

» Vol. iv. p. 182 — 188. The Author has not perhaps
much exaggerated the stupid narrow-mindedness of the

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On this passage I need hardly remark, that the
religious education (to which our Author does
not advert) -of the children of the poor, and that,
up to a much higher point than is at present
generally thought of among us, ought to occupy a
prominent place. And instruction on several other
points also might, I am convinced, be very easily
and very advantageously added. There are some
very simple but important truths belonging to
the science we are now engaged in, which might
with the utmost facility be brought down to the
capacity of a child, and which, it is not too much
to say, the Lower Orders cannot even safely be
left ignorant of. One of them I adverted to in a
former Lecture. Can the labouring classes, (and
that too in a country where they have a legal
right to express practically their political opi-
nions,) can they safely be left to suppose, as
many a demagogue is ready, when it suits his
purpose, to tell them, that inequality of conditions
is inexpedient, and ought to be abolished — that
the wealth of a man whose income is equal to

labouring classes where their education is totally neglected :
but he appears to have very greatly over-rated the intelligence,
the thoughtfalness, and the mental activity of Barbarians.

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that of a hundred labouring families, is so much
deducted from the common stock, and causes
a hundred poor families the less to be maintained ;
— and that a general spoUation of the rich and
equal division of property, would put an end to
poverty for ever * ?

** If ahorse" (says Mandeville, in his treatise
against Charity-schools) **knew as much as a
man, I should not Uke to be his rider." There
is a reason for this beyond what was in the
author's mind. It would be not only unsafe^ but
unjust y to treat a rational Being (which, on that
supposition, the horse would be) as a slave;
governed, not for his own benefit, (however hu-
manely,) but for his master's. If in any country
it is the settled plan to keep the lower Orders
in this kind of brutish subjection, it is at least
consistent to keep them in brutish ignorance
also. But where they are admitted not only to
freedom, but also, many of them, to a share of
political power, it is the height of inconsist-
ency to neglect any means of instructing them
how to make a good use of their advantages.
It seems preposterous to reckon a man fit to take

*• See Sermon '* on Education," preached at Halesworth.

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a part in the management of a ship, and yet unfit
to learn any thing of navigation.

Much of that kind of knowledge to which I
have been alluding, might easily be embodied, in
an intelligible and interesting form, not merely
in regular didactic treatises, but in compilations
of history, or of travels, and in works of fiction,
which would afibrd amusement as well as instruc-
tion. For, amusement, of one kind or another,
men mil seek, and find: and it is therefore a
great point gained in respect of morality, if the
mass of the people can be provided with such as
shall be, even merely not hurtful. He who
advertised a reward for any one who should
discover a new pleasure, would have deserved
well of mankind, if he had stipulated that it
should be innocent. It is not enough to teach
the people to read, and then merely to put the
Bible into their hands. Books should be written
expressly for their use, (and how can men of
education be more laudably occupied ?) not
merely of grave instruction, but also such as may
form in them a taste that shall tend to withdraw
them, in their hours of recreation also, from all
that is gross and corrupting.

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To the workmen in large manufactories in
particular, assistance of such a kind as A. Smith
speaks of, is, from the peculiarly monotonous cha-
racter of their employment', the most needed,
and, from their being collected in such large
bodies, the most easily afforded. Some large
manufacturers have accordingly established schools
and chapels, appropriated to the use of their
enormous families. It is, I cannot but think, a
disgrace to the nation, that this procedure is not,
and has not been long since, universal. Since
A. Smith wrote, much has been done in England
in regard to the education of the people. But
much remains to be done. If we compare our
present condition in this point, not with what it
was thirty years ago, but with what it ought to

* As a set-off against this, however, it shouldbe remembered,
that manufacturers who arc collected in large bodies have the
advantage of mutual intercourse to sharpen their faculties, to
a much greater extent than agricultural labourers. In most
instances they may even during their work be engaged in con-
versation ; which, however unprofitable and even hurtful in
other respects, at least affords some intellectual exercise.
And if their conversation be on the whole of a hurtful or
frivolous character, must not this be attributed in great mea-
sure to the want of a well-conducted education ?

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be, we shall find less reason for self-satisfied
exultation, than for increased exertion.

As for the danger apprehended from over-
educating the labouring classes, I shall ojfGer some
observations presently, on the true character of
that danger, and on the means of averting it.

I wish first to call your attention to another
inconvenience which may result from a high
degree of division of labour: I mean, the addi-
tional liability to the evil of being thrown out of
employment. 1 cannot describe this better than
in the words of the late Professor.

After adverting to the remark of M. Gamier,
in his notes to the French translation of A. Smith,
that in France no man of health and strength
need be without employment, which that Author
attributes to the absence of such restrictions as
our poor-laws impose, Mr. Senior observes, that
nevertheless the common people in France are
worse fed, and incomparably worse clothed, than
in England; and adds, that *' the French
labourer being employed in more capacities than
the Englishman, has more trades to turn to, and
for that very reason is less efficient at any one.
The Russian is probably more seldom out of em-

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ploy than the Frenchman, and the Tartar, less
frequently than either. But I believe nothing to
be more clearly established than that, caeteris
paribus, the productiveness of labour is in pro-
portion to its subdivision; and that, caeteris pari-
bus, in proportion to that subdivision must be
the occasional suffering from want of employ-
ment."

*' A Savage may be compared to one of his own
instruments, to his club, or his adze, clumsy and
inefficient, but yet complete in itself*. A civil-
ized artificer is Uke a single wheel or roller,
which when combined with many thousand others
in an elaborate piece of machinery, contributes
to effects which seem beyond human force and

' It is curious to contrast the case of Alexander Selkirk, who
was left for some years on the Island of Juan Fernandez,
with that of a Musquito-Indian mentioned in Dampier's
Voyages, who was also left (but by accident) on the very
same Island, for about as long a time. The savage cheerfully
exercised all the little ingenuity possessed by his tribe, in
providing himself with such implements, clothing, and habita-
tion, as he had been accustomed to ; and was found living in
much the same style as prevails among the nation of Indians.
The European was overwhelnied with melancholy, and seems
scarcely to have exerted any of his powers.

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ingenuity; but alone is almost utterly use-
less/'

The inconvenience here described is both an
evil in itself, and also (what is more especially to
our present purpose) tends towards a demoral-
izing eflfect through the medium of the occasional
distress resulting from it. It is an inconvenience
which, though it may be greatly mitigated, cannot,
I think, be entirely obviated, in an advanced state
of Society, without not only foregoing the ad-
vantage of the division of labour, but introducing
the most oppressive conxpulsory enactments; since,
where there is a free competition, that workman
will always obtain a preference, who, from having
chiefly confined himself to one kind of operation,
possesses superior skill. It is proverbial, that
the man of many trades does not thrive, being,
in each department, surpassed by others; and re-
sembling Homer's Margites, who practised many
artSy but all, unskilfully:

** Plato, in his Erastae, represents Socrates ridiculing one
who represented a Philosopher as this kind of person, having
a slight knowledge of various arts, hut perfect in none, and

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But there are . means by which the evil in
question may be much alleviated. A small de-
gree of care in education will diminish the ex-
treme helplessness which is often found in manu-
facturing labourers. The women in particular
are often so improvident, in devoting themselves
exiclusively and unremittingly to a single opera-
tion, for the sake of earning higher wages for the
preaenty that they grow up ignorant of the com-
mon domestic offices ; and when they marry,
are wholly dependent on such as they hire for
those purposes ; so that a fall of wages, or want
of work, reduces their famiUes to a state of much
greater discomfort, than others, with the same
absolute poverty, have to encounter. The plan
has been adopted accordingly in many schools,
of teaching the children, even of both sexes, botji
needlework and several other little manual arts,
which at all times may be a convenience to them,
and, in emergencies, may materially alleviate the
pressure of distress.

Another expedient which provident good-sense
would suggest as a safeguard against the worst

like the Pentathlete in the Games. When, says he, good art-
ists are to be had, such a one is useless.

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extremities of this evil, is, that the several mem-
bers of a family should betake themselves, as far
as that is possible, to different occupations; by
which means, as it will very seldom happen that
a stagnation of trade will equally aflfect all at the
same time, they will be enabled to assist each
other. Each family may thus in some degree
combine within itself the variety of employments
which exists in the whole community; in which,
now one, and now another class, will be com-
paratively depressed, though the whole may be
prosperous and advancing.

It is true, the proposed expedient can be but
very imperfectly adopted in a town that is the
seat of some great manufacture which absorbs
perhaps four-fifths of the inhabitants ; and even
in other cases, there is generally some little
advantage in p(Hnt of convenience and of present
gain, in the c^posite procedure: but it is the
very province of prudence, to sacrifice a smaller
immediate, to a greater future, benefit.

But the great resource is, in haUts of fore-
thought and frugaUty. The Savings-Banks, which
Bishop Sumner recommended with such philan-
thropic zeal^and which he has happily lived to see

Q

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very generaUy established, have done, and are do^
ing» incalculable good in this way ; though, if they
had become general some ten or twenty years
earlier, at the time when wages were at the
highest, they would have saved probably much
moral degradation, resulting from the distress
which followed. It hs^ppens as a fortunately
countervailing circumstance, that in those very
employments which are the most liable to fluc-
tuation, wages are, generally speaking, the high-
est : so that in prosperous times, the workman
of steady habits, and not, Uke the savage, a slave
to present gratification and thoughtless of the
futiure, may accumulate a Uttle store, which^
when employment falls short, may either enable
him to subsist till times improve again, or till
he shall have acquired a competent skill in some
oth^ kindred art; or else, to remove with his
family to some place where he can earn sup*
port.

Of the two evils then, which are connected
with the division of labour, the contraction of
the faculties and consequent debasement of mind,
resulting from a too limited range of occupation,
and, the danger of being thrown out of work.

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the appropriate remedies are, I think, to be
found in judicious education, and habits of pro-
vident frugality. That advanced state of Society,
which is the most exposed to the evils, is also
the most favourable to the application of the
remedies.

The other danger to which a community may
be exposed, through great and increasing wealth,
is connected with that augmentation and diffh-
sion of knowledge, and of intellectual culture,
to which it naturally leads. Many apprehend
mischief from what they call over-education pf
the mass of the people ; the too great amount,
or too ^sudden increase, of the knowledge placed
within their reach— of tibeir taste for intellectual
pursuits — and their disposition to think and
judge for themselves* They are thence, it is
said, disposed to be puflfed up with conceit at
their superiority to their unenlightened fore-
fathers, arrogant, and averse to subordination —
deeming themselves competent to decide on
fevery question — rashly embracing crude theories,
and craving after innovation, from an idea that
all ancient institutions must be either obsolete
remnants of a state of general barbarism and

q2

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darkness, or contrivances of fraudulent oppressors
for imposing on the simple.

I am far from thinking that serious dangers of
this kind do not arise as accompaniments c^ the
progress of Society, in wealth, and in knowledge,
and intelUgence. But I am convinced they do
not arise from the too great amount, or too great
difiusion, of mental cultivation, hut from mis-
directed and disproportionate cultivation. And this
misdirection does not consist so much in the
imparting of knowledge which had better be
withheld from a particular class, or the exercise
of faculties which, in them, had better be left
dormant, as in the violation of proportion — the
neglect of preserving a due balance between
different studies and different mental powers.
No illustration will better explain my meaning
than that of the bodily growth. A child neg-
lected at the period of growth, will become
ricketty and deformed, from some of the limbs
receiving perhaps no absolutely undue increase,
but a disproportioned increase ; while others, do
not indeed shrink, nor perhaps cease to grow, but
do not increase at the same rate. In such a case,
we sometimes say that the head or the trunk is

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grown too large for the limbs ; meaning, however,
not absolutely, but relatively ; — ^not that the
growth of one part is in itself excessive, but that
the other parts have not kept pace with it. And
though such a distortion is worse even than a
general dwarfish and stunted growth, it is obvious
that a full and regular development of all the
parts, is far preferable to either ; and also, that it
is, when Nature is making an efibrt towards
growth, not only more desirable but more prac-
ticable, to make that an equable and well-pro-
portioned growth, than to repress it altogether.
We should endeavour rather to strengthen the
weak parts, than to weaken the strong. But if
we take no pains to do either the one or the
other, it is plain that both the corporeal, and
also the intellectual and moral, expansion, must
lead to disease and deformity.

As far as relates to Religion, the most im-
portant point of all, both in itself, and as far as
relates to the question now more immediately
before us, I will avail myself of the words of a
recent publication, which express sentiments in.
which I wholly coincide.

** Avast and momentous moral crisis is rapidly

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approaching — the rise of Education throughout
the mass of the People. Amidst pretensions to
sensible spiritual communion on the one hand,
and a careful avoidance of recognising any divine
interposition on the other — ^amidst theories in*
vented or imported, that would subject the sacred
volume to the rules of mere ordinary criticism,
opposed only in partial and personal controversy—
a large portion of the community, which has
been hitherto uneducated, is suddenly roused into
free inquiry, and furnished with ability to per-
ceive all that darkens and deforms the subject ;
but — ^it must be owned and lamented — ^not fur-
nished with that spiritual training, which alone
enables the inquirer to see his way through it.

** It is not that the people at large are without
any religious and moral instrurition — it is not
that they have absolutely less now than hereto-
fore — ^they have probably more. But the pro-
gress of spiritual and worldly knowledge is un-
equal ; and it is this inequality of progress that
constitutes the danger. It is a truth which cannot
be too strongly insisted on, that if the powers
of the intellect be strengthened by the acquisi-
tion of science, professional learning, or general

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literature — in short, secular knowledge, of what-
ever kind, without being proportionately exercised
on spiritual subjects, its susceptibility of the ob-
jections which may be urged against Revelation
will be increased, without a corresponding in-
crease in the ability to remove them. Conscious
of having mastered certain difficulties that attach
to subjects which he has studied, one so educated
finds it impossible to satisfy himself about diffi-
ipulties in Revelation ; Revelation not having re-
ceived from him the same degree of attention ;
and, forgetful of the unequal distribution of his
studies, charges the fault on the subject. Doubt,
discontent, and contemptuous infidelity, (more
frequently secret than avowed,) are no unusual
results. It seems indeed to have been required of
us by the Author of Revelation, that his Word
should have a due share of our intellect, as well
as of our heart ; and that the disproportionate
direction of our talents, no less than of our affec-
tions, to the things of this world, should disqualify
us for faith. What is sufficient sacred knowledge
for an uneducated person, becomes inadequate
for him when educated; even as he would be
crippled and deformed, if the limb which was
Strong and well-proportioned when he was a

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child, should have undergCNOie no progressive
change as his bodily stature increased, and he
grew into manhood. We must not think to
satisfy the divine law, by setting apart the same
absolute amount as the tithe of our enlarged
understanding, which was due from a narrower
and more barren field of intellectual culture.

'' Nor let it be imagined that this is true only of
minds highly gifted, and accomplished in science,
elegant literature, or professional pursuits. It is
not the absolute amount of worldly acquirements,
but the proportion that they bear to our religious
attainments, be these what they may, that is to be
dreaded. If the balance of intellectual exercise
be not preserved, the almost certain result will
be, either an utter indifference to religion; or
else, that slow-corroding scepticism, which is
fostered by the consciousness, that difficulties cor-
responding to those that continue to perplex our
view of Revelation have, in our other pursuits,
been long surmounted and removed ^"

It may be added, that with respect to another
matter also of high importance in itself, and (as
I trust has been shewn) not unconnected with

^ Hinds on Inspiration, p. 4 — 6.

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rdigion, — Political-Economy, as ignorance, or
erroneous views concerning it, are in themselves
to be deprecated, so, there is here also, an
especial danger in a disproportionate neglect.
For since men who regard themselves as gene-
rally well-educated, will always, however un-
educated they may in fact be in respect of these
subjects, reckon themselves, though they may
shun the name of PoUtical-Economy, competent
judges of the questions pertaining to it, which
appear to be every one's business, the consequence
must be, that their education on other points
will only serve to superadd to their ignorance,
the rashness of confident self-conceit.

How far either in respect of these or of other
points any given community may be exposed
to the dangers resulting from an ill-regulated
and disproportionate growth, must depend on
the rapidity of its increase in wealth and in-
telligence, combined with the negligence, or the
obstinacy, with which its members forget, or
refuse, to conform themselves to the situation in
which they are placed : — to the degree of pre-
valence (to speak more precisely) of two opposite
errors: one, that of such as deprecate the in-

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crease and spread of intellectual culture, as in
itself an evil, though an evil which, after all, they
can only murinur at, hut not effectually repress ;
and look back with vain regret on those ages
of primitive rudeness and torpid ignorance, which
they cannot recall ; the other, that of those
whose views, though more cheerful, are not
more enlightened — who hail with joy every
symptom of any kind of advancement, without
at all troubling themselves to secure an equable
and well-balanced advancement, or apprehending,
or ever thinking of, any possible mischief from
the want of it. The one party sighs for the
restoration of infancy ; the other exults in the
approach of a distorted maturity.

This subject, if fully developed, would alone oc-
cupy a considerable volume. It will be sufficient
for our present purpose, to have merely pointed
out to you the considerations which deserve your
attention, and to have slightly hinted at the
circumstances which may occasion one commu-
nity to avail itself better, and another worse,
of the advantages which wealth and civilization
afford, with a view to moral improvement.

It is plain, that if, of two communities equal

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in wealth, the one were to make the wisest, the
other the most unwise, use of this advantage,
their moral conditions would be immensely dif-
ferent ; though it would be not the less true, that
a real advantage had been placed within the
reach of both.

Let it be supposed, for instance, that in the
one, the higher classes were anxiously occupied
in diiRising the blessings of education among the
people, and had provided adequately for the
instruction both of children and adults; taking care
that the most essential points of education should
occupy the foremost place, and the next to them,
the next ; and exercising the judgment of a culti-
vated understanding as to the relative importance
of each, and as to the best modes of conveying in-
struction in each : let us suppose their wealth to
be employed in making an adequate provision
for a suflScient number of respectable religious
teachers, and of places of worship, to meet fully
the wants of their population: let the schools
again, for the education of the children of their
own class, be conducted on a similar principle ;
making sound religious instruction, and the cul-
tivation of sincere and practical religious habits,

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the primary object of attention, and placing
every other branch of education in its proper
order; taking especial care not to let shewy
accomplishments become a readier path to dis-
tinction than substantial cultivation of the under-
standing ; and guarding most sedulously against
that besetting danger, the introduction into their
schools of a wrong code of morality — a false
point of honour^ distinct from, or at variance with,
Christian principle : let their Universities, again,
and other institutions for ulterior education, be so
regulated as to exhibit in the disposition of their
endowments, the full efficiency of well-directed
wealth, in carrying on a plan of manly instruc-
tion, of which the foundations should have been
laid in earlier years ; not sending forth into the
world, to assume the office of legislators and
directors of public affairs, such as shall have
completed their education without having ever
even begun the study of the subjects with which
they are to be conversant, except so far as they
may have taken upon trust some long- venerated
prejudices ; but men qualified for the high pro-
fession they are to follow, by a preparation
analogous to what is required even of the humblest

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artisan: — let these objects, and such as these,
occupy the attention, and employ the resources,
of an enlightened and opulent community — let
them be, I do not ^^j ^ perfectly attained^ (since
perfection is not to be expected of man,) but at
least sedulously aimed aty proposed as objects —
thought of; (and this surely is no impossibility:) —
and let the other community, perversely or neg-
ligently, pursue, in all or in many of these points,
an opposite course ; and it is easy to pronounce
which of the two is employing its wealth with
the better prospect of success, in attaining supe-
rior objects; — ^which is likely to improve, and
which to stand still or to fall back, in respect of
true national greatness ; — which is the more ad-
vanced, and has the fairer prospect of advancing,
towards a higher and better kind of civilization
than any nation has hitherto exhibited. And
yet each party shall have received perhaps the
very same number of Talents, though the one
promises fair to double them, and the other is in
danger of having them taken away.

I have thought it best thus to introduce the
subject of Political-Economy, by directing your

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attention to some of the topics by which the
current prejudices against the study may be
removed, and its importance evinced, because I
feel certain that you will often have occasion to
encounter such prejudices, and will often meet
with persons who imderrate that importance.

In my next Lecture **, I shall endeavour to ex-
plain some practical principles relative to the
mode in which the Science should be studied,
which I think ought to be kept in view by those
who are engaged in, and especially by those who
are first entering on, the pursuit.

^ It may be proper here to remark, that in the Lecture
alluded to I endeavoured to evince the paramount importance
of precise language in this study, and to lay down some cau-
tions with a view to the attainment of ^at object.

THE END.

VAXTEK, PniNTKR, OXFOIIU.

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